Court Opinion

ID: 9663949
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 23:55:29.358526+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:14:59.442222
License: Public Domain

COYNE, Justice
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent: First, because the majority has abandoned the recognized rule for reviewing a facially neutral crime control statute in favor of an activist form of judicial review which allows the court to substitute its view of the basis for and efficacy of the statute for that of the legislature; and second, because, based on its assumption that crack cocaine and cocaine powder are identical substances — a matter on which experts disagree — the majority proceeds on the false premise that the legislature may not found a legislative distinction on differences in the form and marketing of the two substances.
I begin my analysis by emphasizing the limitations on this court’s role vis a vis the legislature in matters relating to crime control and the punishment of crimes. As we have stated in other contexts, the judicial branch of government in Minnesota has no inherent authority to set the terms or conditions of punishment for a criminal act. Instead, the power to define appropriate punishment for criminal conduct rests with the legislature as a corollary to its broader power to define what acts constitute criminal conduct. State v. Osterloh, 275 N.W.2d 578 (Minn.1978). Justice Powell stated it this way in McCleskey v. Kemp, 481 U.S. 279, 319, 107 S.Ct. 1756, 1781, 95 L.Ed.2d 262 (1987):
*896It is not the responsibility — or indeed even the right — of this Court to determine the appropriate punishment for particular crimes. It is the legislatures, the elected representatives of the people, that are ‘constituted to respond to the will and consequently the moral values of the people.’ (citation omitted).
Everyone agrees that under the equal protection clause1 the legislature is not free to make punishment turn on “an unjustifiable standard such as race, religion, or other arbitrary classification.” Oyler v. Boles, 368 U.S. 448, 456, 82 S.Ct. 501, 506, 7 L.Ed.2d 446 (1962). However, in reviewing the constitutionality of legislation under the equal protection clause we should remember the words of Justice Holmes, which are as true today as they were nearly 90 years ago:
Great constitutional provisions must be administered with caution. Some play must be allowed for the joints of the machine, and it must be remembered that legislatures are ultimate guardians of the liberties and welfare of the people in quite as great a degree as the courts.
Missouri, Kansas & Texas Ry. Co. v. May, 194 U.S. 267, 270, 24 S.Ct. 638, 639, 48 L.Ed. 971 (1904) (fourteenth amendment equal protection case). We should not lightly or casually presume discriminatory purpose by the legislature.
Certainly, courts must subject any law that makes a classification based on race— any law that is not neutral on its face — to the “most rigid scrutiny” and must strike down the legislation as violative of equal protection unless the state can justify the law by demonstrating that the weightiest of considerations necessitated its enactment. McLaughlin v. Florida, 379 U.S. 184, 85 S.Ct. 283, 13 L.Ed.2d 222 (1964) (holding the Florida miscegenation law violated the fourteenth amendment). But a law like the statute at issue, which is facially neutral and serves ends properly within the power of government to pursue, is not invalid under the equal protection clause unless the party attacking it can prove discriminatory intent or purpose.
Proof of discriminatory intent or purpose requires more, however, than showing that the legislature relied on anecdotal evidence, that the legislature’s action is of doubtful wisdom, or that the legislature was aware that the law might “affect a greater proportion of one race than of another.” Washington v. Davis, 426 U.S. 229, 242, 96 S.Ct. 2040, 2049, 48 L.Ed.2d 597 (1976). The evidence must affirmatively demonstrate an invidious motive or purpose, id.— that is, that the legislature acted as it did, at least in part, “because of an anticipated * * * discriminatory effect” and not simply “ ‘in spite of’ its adverse effects upon an identifiable group.” McCleskey, 481 U.S. at 298, 107 S.Ct. at 1770 (quoting Personnel Adm’r of Massachusetts v. Feeney, 442 U.S. 256, 279, 99 S.Ct. 2282, 2296, 60 L.Ed.2d 870 (1979)) (emphasis in latter added). Only when it has been established that a discriminatory purpose was “a motivating factor” in the legislature’s decision, is judicial deference no longer justified. Village of Arlington Heights v. Metropolitan Housing Corp., 429 U.S. 252, 265-66, 97 S.Ct. 555, 563, 50 L.Ed.2d 450 (1977).
As background to a consideration of the validity of the Minnesota law which was *897enacted in 1989, it should be noted that the Minnesota legislation was preceded by the federal Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986. That act amended 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(B) to equate 100 grams of cocaine powder and 1 gram of cocaine base or crack cocaine— the so-called “100 to 1 ratio” — for the purpose of determining punishment.2 Under the federal act an offense involving mixtures weighing 5 grams or more containing cocaine base was subject to the same harsh punishment as an offense involving mixtures weighing 500 grams or more containing cocaine powder. United States v. Levy, 904 F.2d 1026, 1032 (6th Cir.1990), cert. denied, — U.S.-, 111 S.Ct. 974, 112 L.Ed.2d 1060 (1991). Our own Eighth Circuit, in rejecting a fifth amendment due process challenge to the act, pointed to the fact that Congress considered cocaine base or crack cocaine to be more dangerous than cocaine powder because of crack’s potency, its more highly addictive nature, and its greater accessibility because of its.relatively low cost. United States v. Buckner, 894 F.2d 975, 978-79 (8th Cir.1990). I further note that the act has withstood claims that it violates fifth amendment equal protection. As stated in United States v. Cyrus, 890 F.2d 1245, 1248 (D.C.Cir.1989):
A legislative body need not explicitly state its reasons for passing legislation so long as a court can devine some rational purpose, (citation omitted). Here, such purposes are readily apparent. Crack is far more addictive than cocaine. It is far more accessible due to its relatively low cost. And it has experienced an explosion of popularity, (citation omitted). Any one of these factors would furnish a rational basis for the [100 to 1] distinction.
While considering ways of addressing the crisis created by crack cocaine, the 1989 Minnesota legislature heard testimony similar to that which in 1986 prompted Congress to adopt the “100 to 1 ratio.” For example, the legislature was presented with evidence that crack cocaine and cocaine powder are not, as defendants contend and as the majority unjustifiably assumes, the same substance but different substances justifying dissimilar legislative treatment. The record demonstrates that although crack cocaine is derived from cocaine powder, the two substances have both a slightly different chemical composition3 and a different pharmacological effect. The unique characteristics of crack cocaine were discussed not only in the legislative hearings but also in the affidavit of defendants’ own expert in this litigation, M. Dawn Speier, Public Health Chemist for the City of Minneapolis. According to her, smoking crack cocaine “delivers a highly concentrated dose — at least 3 times that delivered by snorting an equivalent dose of cocaine powder — to the brain” and “abusers lose control faster with crack smoking than with snorting [powder].”4 Similarly, *898other experts have opined that “although it can take months or years for a nasal cocaine [powder] user to progress from recreational use, this can happen within days to weeks with crack.” H.I. Spitz & J.S. Rose-can, Cocaine Abuse: New Directions in Treatment and Research 300-01 (1987). The combination of the low cost per unit of crack cocaine and the highly addictive nature of the substance has created an epidemic of crack trafficking and use, has fueled gang behavior, has destroyed individuals (including innocent babies, who, as a result of their mothers’ addiction, are born addicted),5 has destroyed families, and has ruined entire neighborhoods, prompting one of the authors of the 1989 legislation to conclude that crack cocaine is “by far the single most dangerous drug ever encountered.”
This is not to say that today experts agree on the significance of the differences in the chemistry and effect of cocaine powder and crack,6 or that there is unanimity on the significance of the differences in the marketing of cocaine powder and crack. But the legislature, like a jury, is generally free to determine what weight, if any, to give to the testimony of a particular expert. The legislature was persuaded by the evidence before it in 1989 that cocaine powder and crack cocaine require different legislative treatment either because they are different substances or because they are marketed differently, but the legislature was unwilling to use Congress’ “100 to 1” ratio and instead equated possession of 10 grams or more of cocaine powder with possession of 3 grams or more of crack cocaine (a “10 to 3 ratio”) in order to deal evenhandedly with the typical street-level dealer of crack cocaine and the typical street-level dealer of cocaine powder. Rather obviously, the 1989 statute defining controlled substance crimes in the third degree was designed to discourage the sale of cocaine in either powder or crack form, for the legislature appears to have based the 10 to 3 ratio on evidence that a typical street-level cocaine dealer would possess, at the minimum and without regard to purity, 3 grams of crack or 10 grams of powder. The legislature also considered evidence regarding customary units of sale and the sale price of such a unit. On the one hand, the customary unit of sale of crack is a “rock” weighing .1 gram and selling on the street for $20 or $25. Thus, 3 grams of crack comprises approximately 30 distinct saleable units or “rocks” of crack having an aggregate street value of $600 to $750. On the other hand, although 10 grams of cocaine powder represents about 40 doses of cocaine powder, the customary unit of sale is the “8-ball,” Vs ounce or about 3.5 grams, which sells for about $350. Ten grams of powder, then, comprise less than three saleable units of cocaine powder and have a street value of about $1,000. Accordingly, the weight ratio required in Minnesota to bring possession of powder or crack within the same degree crime is not the harsher (from the perspective of the crack possessor) federal ratio of 100 to 1 but is, rather, a ratio of 10 to 3. If, moreover, one looks to the realities of the street, the ratios shift dramatically: in terms of monetary value 10 grams of powder is worth about 1⅛ times that of 3 grams of crack, a ratio of 4 to 3; and in *899terms of saleable units, the possessor of 3 grams of crack holds about 30 saleable units to the three or less units of sale held by the possessor of 10 grams of cocaine powder, a ratio of 1 to 10 in favor of the crack holder. Finally, the majority assumes that the conversion ratio of pure cocaine powder to crack is 100%. It is not.7 The witness who testified to a conversion rate of about 90% in the laboratory stated that because the purity of cocaine powder varied from month to month or even week to week and because crack houses operated rather less efficiently than laboratories, 10 grams of cocaine powder produced about 6 grams of crack. Thus, there is no basis upon which it can be said that 10 grams of cocaine powder is the equivalent of 10 grams of crack.
Moreover, even though cocaine is the “active ingredient” in both crack cocaine and cocaine powder, this court has previously acknowledged and approved a legislatively defined distinction based on the form in which a substance was marketed. State ex rel. Flores v. Tahash, 272 Minn. 451, 454, 138 N.W.2d 626, 628 (1965) (legislative classification of codeine tablets as controlled substance upheld although a higher dosage of codeine per teaspoonful was available to the public in nonprescription cough syrup). Crack cocaine is used differently than is cocaine powder. According to the evidence before the legislature cocaine in the form of crack is a more highly addictive drug than cocaine in the form of powder. Crack cocaine is sold by the “rock,” an easily transferable form with a unit price which makes it available to a larger group of consumers, including children. Equal quantities by weight of crack cocaine and cocaine powder have different monetary values. These differences in form and marketing raise social questions which, it seems to me, the legislature is entitled and competent to address by legislatively defined distinction.
The structure of the 1989 statute reveals a two-pronged attack designed to discourage drug dealing by simplifying prosecution of controlled substance crimes and setting stiffer penalties for violation. First, the legislature separated sale crimes from possession crimes, eliminating from possession crimes the element of intent to sell, an often difficult element of proof. Note, Illegal Drugs, New Laws and Justice: An Examination of Five Recently Enacted Minnesota Statutes, 16 Wm. Mitchell L.Rev. 499, 523-24 (1990). On the other prong the legislature created various degrees of controlled substance crimes and set different levels of punishment for each degree of controlled substance crime. There can be little doubt that the statute is aimed at drug dealers, for the level of frequency of unlawful sale and the amount of controlled substance sold or the amount possessed spelled out as constituting first, second, and third degree of controlled substance crime depict a kind of hierarchy of dealership: (1) the greater the sale, the more serious the crime and (2) typically, those who commit first degree crimes of possession are persons who might be called drug wholesalers; those who commit possession crimes in the second degree are large retailers; and those who commit third degree crimes of possession are street dealers — those who are users only and do not sell to others are quite unlikely to have in their possession such amounts of controlled substance.8 I disagree with the majority’s conclusion that by declining to make intent to sell an element of possession crimes the legislature has in effect created an impermissible presumption. The legislature, as it was free to do, simply eliminated the crime of possession with intent to sell while retaining the crime of *900unlawful possession of a controlled substance.9
Moreover, although the 1989 statute imposed more severe penalties than did its predecessor, the legislative history of the bill demonstrates a legislative intent not to punish the typical street-level dealer of crack more harshly than the typical street-level dealer of cocaine powder but, by pegging degrees of the crime of possession of a controlled substance and their respective penalties to the amounts of controlled substance typically possessed only by dealers of a particular level of dealership, to punish equally dealers of crack cocaine and dealers of cocaine powder. If one looks only at the evidence as to the amounts in terms of grams typically possessed by street-level dealers, the legislature was justified in assuming that it was accomplishing that purpose by classifying both unlawful possession of 10 grams of powder and unlawful possession of 3 grams of crack as third degree controlled substance crimes. If, however, one converts those quantities of cocaine powder and crack into typical units of sale (10 grams of powder represents less than three saleable units and 3 grams of crack represents 30 saleable units), the legislature treated possessors of crack more leniently.
Reasonable people can disagree about the wisdom of the legislature’s classification scheme. But I disagree with the majority’s conclusion that the classification scheme adopted by the legislature violates defendants’ right to equal protection of the laws.
It is true that the trial court had before it evidence that of the 32 persons charged in Hennepin County from August 1, 1989 through August 1, 1990 with possession of 3 or more grams of crack, 31 were African-American. That same evidence also revealed that 16 of the 28 persons charged with possession of 10 or more grams of cocaine powder were African-Americans. Apart from the doubtful validity of any conclusion based on an informal review of a statistical population of 60 drawn from a single county,10 such evidence may bear on the inquiry as to whether the legislature had a discriminatory purpose; but although “[disproportionate impact is not irrelevant, * * * it is not the sole touchstone of an invidious racial discrimination.” Arlington Heights, 429 U.S. at 265, 97 S.Ct. at 563 (quoting Washington, 426 U.S. at 242, 96 S.Ct. at 2049).
Here the record is barren of any evidence of discriminatory purpose by the legislature. Indeed, if I were a member of the legislature who voted for the 1989 legislation I would be insulted by any attribution, however indirect, of discriminatory purpose because the record not only does not show the presence of discriminatory purpose, it tends to negate the presence of discriminatory purpose:
(a) Instead of adopting the harsher 100 to 1 gram weight ratio adopted by Congress in 1986, the legislature adopted a 10 to 3 gram weight ratio, hardly evidence of discriminatory purpose.
(b) Despite strong evidence of crack’s greater danger to individuals and society, the legislature’s aim apparently was not to punish street-level dealers of crack more harshly than street-level dealers of cocaine powder. Rather its apparent intent or purpose was to treat them equally, hardly evidence of discriminatory purpose.
*901(c) The full record discloses that the statutes dealing with controlled substance crimes were only one element of a multifaceted approach to the drug problem. Simultaneously, the legislature also considered bills to provide additional funds for drug education and prevention and bills directed to development of quality drug abuse treatment for low income and minority people.11
(d) The statutes dealing with controlled substance crimes were but one part of a large package of significant crime control legislation enacted in 1989. See Wolf, 1989 Crime Legislation, in Minn.C.L.E. 24th Annual Criminal Justice Institute (1989). Not only is the record devoid of evidence to support the contention that the legislature acted with discriminatory intent or purpose, it seems to me that it affirmatively shows that the legislature acted without discriminatory intent or purpose.
The record similarly fails to support defendants’ contention that police and prosecutors have applied the law in a discriminatory manner. As firmly-rooted judicial precedent mandates, a defendant seeking the dismissal of charges on this basis must prove that others similarly situated have not been prosecuted and that he or she has been singled out for prosecution on the basis of an impermissible consideration such as race. See, e.g., State v. Russell, 343 N.W.2d 36, 37 (Minn.1984) (relying on Arlington Heights, 429 U.S. 252, 97 S.Ct. 555, 50 L.Ed.2d 450, and Washington, 426 U.S. 229, 96 S.Ct. 2040). In Russell, we upheld the burglary conviction of a black man caught in a so-called “sting” operation despite the fact that 48 black persons and only one white person were prosecuted in the sting. We concluded that the defendant had not met his burden of proving discriminatory enforcement.
[I]t appears that the police were conducting a neutral undercover operation in predominantly black neighborhoods that were plagued by a high residential burglary rate and that their sole purpose was to identify and prosecute as many of the offenders as possible. The fact that most of the offenders in predominantly black neighborhoods were black does not establish purposeful discrimination any more than the fact that most of the offenders were white would establish purposeful discrimination in an undercover operation in a predominately white neighborhood having a similar high residential burglary rate.
Id. at 38.
I have no reason to doubt the assertion that, based upon the 60 persons charged in Hennepin County with violations of section 152.023 during the one-year period ending August 1, 1990, more African-Americans than white persons were prosecuted for possession of 3 grams or more of crack cocaine and 10 grams or more of cocaine powder. However, defendants have failed to establish either that those other defendants were selected for prosecution on the basis of their race or that they themselves have been selected for prosecution on the basis of race. Indeed, it appears that is not the case. According to the Minnesota Office of Drug Policy:
The great bulk of the 1989 Minneapolis arrests of minorities came from crack house raids during which many people were often arrested simply for being in the house in close proximity to crack and drug paraphernalia. The reason for the huge number of entries is that neighbors clamor for them. Neighbors see the symptoms of drug dealing: increased traffic, frequent but short visits by a steady parade of people unrelated to the resident, occasional glimpses of rolls of cash and weapons, etc. They become fearful for themselves and their children, so they call the police.
Minnesota Drug Strategy 1991, Report to the 1991 Minnesota Legislature at 11 (Office of Drug Policy, Jan. 1, 1991). That police response to neighborhood concerns about drug trafficking results in the arrest and ultimate prosecution of a greater number of African-American persons than white persons for the offense in question *902and other drug-related offenses does not, in my opinion, demonstrate discriminatory enforcement any more than if it were demonstrated that a far greater percentage of white persons than African-Americans were arrested and prosecuted for embezzlement or some other crime.
Despite the utter absence of any evidence that the legislature acted with discriminatory intent or pujóse or that law enforcement officers engaged in discriminatory enforcement, the majority, applying what it calls “the rational basis test as articulated under Minnesota law,” has declared Minn.Stat. § 152.023, subd. 2(1) (1989) violative of article I, section 2, the equal protection clause of the Minnesota Constitution. Of course, this court may, and when the scope of a provision in the Minnesota Constitution differs from that of its federal counterpart frequently does, construe the Minnesota Constitution to afford greater individual rights than are afforded by the United States Constitution. E.g., State v. Hershberger, 462 N.W.2d 393 (Minn.1990). But this court has consistently ruled that the rational basis standard used in Minnesota equal protection analysis is the same as the standard used in federal equal protection analysis. E.g., AFSCME Councils 6, 14, 65 and 96 v. Sundquist, 338 N.W.2d 560, 569 n. 11 (Minn.1983); State v. Forge, 262 N.W.2d 341, 347 n. 23 (Minn.1977). The argument that Minnesota applies a rational basis test that differs from the federal standard has been put to this court before and emphatically rejected, most recently in In Re Estate of Turner, 391 N.W.2d 767, 770 n. 2 (Minn.1986) (Wahl, J., concurring specially).
What the majority has actually done here is to engage in substantive review — the kind of review epitomized by Lochner v. New York, 198 U.S. 45, 25 S.Ct. 539, 49 L.Ed. 937 (1905) — “criticized from its inception and * * * generally unmourned since its demise in the middle 1930s.”12 One commentator, a prominent advocate of state constitutional theory, has defined substantive review as “judicial appraisal of the substance of laws directly under [the equal protection clause] * * * unaided by substantive values attributed to other provisions of the Constitution.” 13
In short, substantive review replaces an appropriate standard of review, not with a stricter standard, but with no standard at all. That the majority has substituted its political judgment for that of the legislature is, perhaps, best illustrated by its cavalier dismissal of the testimony which the legislature heard. One cannot, it seems to me, characterize as “anecdotal,” thus connoting the recounting of an isolated, atypical incident, the testimony of a lawyer of the Office of the Hennepin County Attorney who handled about 700 narcotics cases in the four years immediately preceding his testimony or the testimony of a sergeant of the Narcotics Division of the Minneapolis Police Department. Their testimony, although not of scientific precision, was certainly “empirical,” i.e., “derived from or guided by experience,” The American College Dictionary, Random House (1964), and the legislature was clearly entitled to credit that testimony. The majority’s denigration of the testimony differs little in my opinion from a reviewing court’s setting aside a jury’s determination of credibility.
In conclusion, the power to define what act constitutes a crime and to fix the punishment for that crime rests with the legislature. This court has neither the obligation nor the right to interfere with legislation dealing with the control of crime without a very good reason. Absent some evidence of discriminatory intent or purpose, the fact that more black persons than white persons violate Minn.Stat. § 152.023, subd. 2(1) (1989) is not a basis for declaring the statute unconstitutional although it may well be indicative of deep-séated societal failings. Social problems, however, are seldom susceptible of facile definition or scientific proof or easy resolution. In my view, the cumulative evidence the legislature considered and the thoughtful re*903marks of the bill’s authors and of other legislators exhibit only a commendable, concerted, and reasoned good faith effort to address a serious social problem.14
Because I believe that Minn.Stat. § 152.-023, subd. 2(1) (1989) meets the equal protection requirements of both the United States Constitution and the Minnesota Constitution, I would answer the certified question “no” and reverse the trial court.

. The fourteenth amendment to the United States Constitution provides that no state shall “deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." Our state constitution has no comparably worded provision. Minnesota Constitutional Study Commission, Final Report 15 (1973). However, Minn. Const, art. I, § 2 provides that “No member of this State shall be disfranchised or deprived of any of the rights or privileges secured to any citizen thereof, unless by the law of the land or the judgment of his peers.” Since the early part of this century we have treated this “as analogous to” the federal equal protection clause. D. McKnight, Minnesota Rational Relation Test:
The Lochner Monster in the 10,000 Lakes, 10 Wm. Mitchell L.Rev. 709, 723 (1984). With the exception of a few decisions of this court in the late 1970s and early 1980s, this court has treated the federal equal protection clause and our state equal protection clause as being equivalent. Id. More recently, we have “reiterated” that federal and state equal protection law are equivalent. See, e.g., In re Estate of Turner, 391 N.W.2d 767, 770 n. 2 (Minn.1986) (“We reiterate here that the rational basis standard used in Minnesota equal protection analysis is the same as the standard used in federal equal protection analysis.”).

. Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986, Pub.L. No. 99-570, § 1002, 100 Stat. 3207-2 (Oct. 27, 1986).

. Cocaine powder is an acid salt in which cocaine is joined with hydrochloride; the chemical formula is (⅜ 1½ NO4 .HC1. Crack cocaine is a bitter crystalline alkaloid (hence, the term cocaine base) made from cocaine hydrochloride, usually by adding ammonia or baking soda and heating the mixture to drive off the hydrochloride molecule by causing it to react with the ammonia or baking soda.

. Compare with the testimony of Dr. Robert Byck, M.D., Professor of Psychiatry and Pharmacology, Yale University School of Medicine, before Congress in connection with the 1986 legislation:
[I]f you heat [cocaine base] to about the temperature of boiling water, it goes off into a vapor. [Then you can] inhale it into your lungs, and you can take a lot [in]. [By contrast, with cocaine, y]ou can pack your nose only so far * * * * As long as you keep breathing [the crack] vapor, you can get more dosage into yourself. That is the reason why crack * * * is so dangerous. There is an unlimited amount that can go in.
The speed of the material going to the brain is very rapid * * * * [Y]ou get an intense change in the mood of the individual, which initially is extremely pleasant, and someone wants to repeat it. But because it has gone in so fast, the level drops down quickly, and * * * somebody feels terrible * * * * So you take some more.
* * * [Y]ou realize that this is going to get you a bit edgy, so you take alcohol along with it. Multidrug abuse is very common * * * * Taking heroin * * * along with crack is fairly common.
So here we have a substance that is tailor-made to addict people. What do we graft *898onto it? We graft on, first of all, this gigantic import industry of many billions of dollars. Second, our own American marketing methods * * * * [W]hat we have here is the fast food solution. It is not that McDonald’s hamburgers are necessarily better, * * * it is the fact that they are already prepared, they are ready to go, and they come in a little package. Here suddenly, we have cocaine available in a little package, in unit dosage, available at a price that kids can pay initially.
See, e.g., “Crack” Cocaine: Hearing Before the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations of the Senate Committee on Governmental Affairs, 99th Cong., 2d Sess. 13 et seq. (1986). The above testimony of Dr. Byck is quoted in Buckner, 894 F.2d at 979 n. 9.

. See, in this regard, Sturner et al., Cocaine Babies: The Scourge of the '90s, 36 J. of For. Sciences 34 (1991).

. See, e.g., the summary of the testimony of Dorothy Hatsukami, a psychiatric researcher at the University of Minnesota, at the Minnesota Sentencing Guidelines Commission’s recent hearings into the subject of the appropriate punishment for powder cocaine and crack cocaine offenses, in Minneapolis Star Tribune Metro Edition, Oct. 18, 1991, at IB.

. The majority’s assumption reflects the trial court’s incorrect finding that 9 grams of 90% pure cocaine powder converts to a little over 8 grams of crack. The only evidence before the trial court was that 10 grams of 90% pure cocaine powder could be converted to about 8 grams of crack. 10 grams X .90 purity = 9 grams x .90 conversion ratio = 8.1 grams.

. In fact, there was evidence before the legislature that it was uncommon for a street dealer to carry 3 or more grams of crack on his or her person; that that quantity of crack was usually found in crack house raids.

. The cases of both this court and the United States Supreme Court give the legislature wide latitude to determine the elements of a criminal offense and to exclude elements such as knowledge or specific intent. Lambert v. California, 355 U.S. 225, 228, 78 S.Ct. 240, 243, 2 L.Ed.2d 228 (1957); State v. Kremer, 262 Minn. 190, 191, 114 N.W.2d 88, 89 (1962). As one witness put it in support of removing the element of intent to sell, “[even] without the intent to sell, 3 grams of crack is an awful lot of havoc sitting there in someone’s pocket under any circumstances and ought to be punished appropriately." Hearing Before the Criminal Justice Div. of the Minn. House Judiciary Comm., 76th Minn.Leg., Feb. 24, 1989 (statement of Jim Kamin, Assistant Hennepin County Attorney).

. In McCleskey, 481 U.S. at 286-87, 313, 107 S.Ct. at 1763, 1778, the validity of two sophisticated statistical studies that examined more than 2,000 cases was assumed, but the statistics were held insufficient to support an inference of discriminatory intent or unconstitutional discrimination.

. Hearings on S.F. 3-H.F.59, Before the Sub-comm. on Criminal Justice, 76th Minn.Leg., Mar. 3, 1989 (statements of Rep. Kelly); Before the Criminal Justice Div. of the Minn. House Judiciary Comm., 76th MinnXeg., Mar. 10, 1989 (statements of Sen. Luther).

. D. McKnight, Minnesota Rational Relation Test: The Lochner Monster in the 10,000 Lakes, 10 Wm. Mitchell L.Rev. 709, 733 (1984).

. Linde, Due Process of Lawmaking, 55 Neb. L.Rev. 197, 199 (1976).

. Ironically, the effect of this court’s decision may be that street-level crack dealers in Minnesota will find themselves once again being prosecuted in federal court under the "100 to 1” federal statute. It appears that before 1989 the federal prosecutor in Minnesota handled a large number of these cases because the Minnesota law was so lenient when compared with the federal law. St. Paul Pioneer Press Metro Edition, Sept. 3, 1991, at 1C. With this court’s striking the 1989 legislation, which is still more lenient than the federal statute, the federal prosecutor conceivably may once again decide to prosecute street-level crack dealers in Minnesota. Indeed, there is no double jeopardy bar to federal prosecution of these defendants. Heath v. Alabama, 474 U.S. 82, 106 S.Ct. 433, 88 L.Ed.2d 387 (1985); Rinaldi v. United States, 434 U.S. 22, 98 S.Ct. 81, 54 L.Ed.2d 207 (1977); State v. Aune, 363 N.W.2d 741 (Minn.1985).