Discussion on DEA "visit" for purchas(es) of watched chemicals

[DJ]

Ok.. so buying certain chemicals raises certain red flags...

And chem supply places routinely report sales (especially "suspicious" orders) to the DEA..

The DEA then review these many lists of customer contact information they are provided (or do they request the lists?)... then they contact the customers with orders that stand out amongst the others on those lists...

But if the buying of the chemicals isn't illegal in itself...

And so long as the chemicals are just sitting there untampered with if the DEA were to contact the customer and insist upon examining the contents of the shipment or whatever it is that they may insist upon or do...
[is it commonly an actual visit from them in person? or more often a letter from them similar to the one provided in Uncle Fester's Practical Guide to LSD Manufacture?]

What happens next? (Especially if the customer has his explanation for his intentions of legitimate use(s) for the chemical(s) already well-prepared for them?)

Does the DEA just sieze the chemicals from the customer without any evidence at all of any wrongdoing? Nor any plans of future wrongdoing? (even if they haven't been combined into something illegal?) But not charge him with any crime?

If they are chemicals known by the DEA to sometimes be useful in the manufacture of illegal drugs but are not combined into anything,... and are still sitting there unopened (and, of course, weren't ever going to be opened until the customer was ready to use them for his legitimate purposes)...

What would be the DEAs next step?

For example, ...let's just say the customer really had intentions of using them for legitimate purposes and knew nothing whatsoever of their usefulness in creating illegal substances (Of course, the customer will soon learn the alternate use for these chemicals in question after the DEA clues him in to what they are often illegally used for) ..seeing as they could very well just as easily have been purchased by the customer with all intentions to be put to use for something legitimate... How could the line of wrong intention be drawn as to what use the chemicals are going to be put to when they are sitting there untampered with? They simply haven't been put to any use yet!How is it determined?

Are there instances where the DEA discover the chemicals unopened, no lab, and are left without enough evidence to pursue the matter any further? Or is just having them enough for them to go on with whatever it is they want to do to the customer?
And what are the consequences for the customer if the DEA believes that the unopened chemicals were going to be put to illegal use? Is there a charge simply for having the chemicals that "could" be put to illegal use? (even if they haven't been put to any illegal use?) What is that charge?
Does the DEA actually arrest and charge the customer with "intent to commit the crime of manufacture" just for having the chemicals even if unopened?

Are there any SWIMMERS out there that can share any run-ins they've had with the DEA when it comes to ordering watched chemicals so that other SWIMMERS can get a better idea of what the whole ordeal is like and what could be expected?

Basically, what SWIM is sorta getting at is, (as dumb as this would be for him to do... [he's not going to do this!!! it's just to bring about his point a little clearer])... if SWIM were to order, say, all of the chemicals necessary to make PCP for instance... but never intended to make it, ..in fact.. never even opened the box the chemicals arrived in... Can he be charged at that point alone? Even if they found the box still sealed?

What if SWIM wasn't too keen on the stock market and thought a purchase of particular chemicals was a wise investment surely to rise in value over the next 10-15 years and simply bought the chemicals as in investment? [what an odd defense!]... far-fetched, yes... but it is possible a person would do something like that... people purchase items daily that they believe will increase in value over time.. coins, baseball cards..stamps..etc... that are stored away for years ... there's nothing to say that a SWIMMER wouldn't want to make investments in certain chemicals as others invest in baseball cards... So, say SWIM purchased the chemicals as an investment. That wouldn't be a justifiable reason enough for the purchase to make them go away either, huh? (even though the stuff is NOT EVEN OPENED!)

SWIM wishes the DEA would just back off!

Reputation Comments on this post:

Good thread

[mick mouse]

SWIM has experience in this area. it is going to cost SWIM 5 years in prison. In arizona, the DEA normally turns it over to the HIDTA task force, operating out of Phoenix and currently headed by Tracy McBride and Rich Burden (Richie). They conducted what is called a "trash rip" in which they steal the trash out of your front yard in order to look for something incriminating that they can use to get a warrant. In SWIMs case, it was two diabetic syringes. SWIMs wife is a diabetic, but that didn't seem to be enough to get the warrant thrown out for illegal search and seizure. It also didn't seem to matter that they committed trespass and burglary in order to acquire the trash. They then got a warrant and conducted a raid which involved a state task force, LE from two counties, State LE, and several officers from different cities who needed the training, I suppose.

SWIM lived in a town of about 350-400 people, they raided on his wifes birthday, held SWIM, SWIMs wife, son, sons fiance, and several family friends who had gathered for a small birthday breakfast at gunpoint for 10 1/2 hours in the front yard. Child and family services showed up to take SWIMs kids and grandkid away. They destroyed SWIMs home and caused over 10,000.00 dollars of damage to the residence(rented, SWIM had to pay for the damage) as well as over 5,000.00 damage to SWIMs personal property. This didn't count the value of items seized, such as computers, guns, money, jewelry, etc.

SWIMs crime was to be suspected of ordering 100 grams of red phosphorus online from a chemical company in London, England.

They found 3 grams of red phosphorus (SWIM is Wiccan and used RP in certain rituals), An unopened bottle of iodine (SWIM had a horse with hoof rot and three cows in his back yard), various chemicals such as paint thinners/removers, japan dryer, acetone, brake cleaner, and epsom salts(chemicals were all securely locked up in a metal cabinet in SWIMS woodworking shop, brake cleaner was found at SWIMS car, which had the front wheel off and the brakes disassembled, epsom salts were in the bathroom).

All of the chemicals found were in amounts UNDER 16 ounces.

They found "chemistry glassware", which was old mason jars in a box clearly labeled "yard sale", plastic funnels in the kitchen, coffee filters right next the the Mr. Coffee machine, and two plastic gas tanks which had been taped together and connected with a hose for a really huge gastank for SWIMs go-cart. They also found pool cleaners and PH test strips right next to the pool that SWIMs kids played in.

No doubt about it, SWIM is a meth cook!

They DIDN'T find any PSE, pill binders, used chemicals, active processes or traces of active processes or proof that could be construed as "beyond a shadow of a doubt". The home tested clean, SWIMs kids passed a bloodtest looking for traces of meth, SWIM and his wife passed the same tests, SWIM and wife has tested clean 4-5 times a week for the past 15 months!

In LE's defense, they DID find 2/3 of a gram of meth (it actually weighed out to .64, they reported it to the secret grand jury for purposes of an indictment as "23 grams" and later changed that to "2-3 grams", even though they had the lab report in hand at the time of the indictment), they also found 10.3 grams of marijuana in three different containers, all of which were in one of our guests daypack. Prior to his arrest on a probation violation charge that day, he notified LE that all of the drugs and paraphenalia found in the house belonged to him. LE rewarded him for his honesty by assaulting him in the front yard, causing injuries (the officer who did this is currently under investigation by the FBI and internal affairs for planting evidence in a drug case and sexual assault in an unrelated case).

LE was trying to give SWIM 18 3/4 to 24 1/2 years, SWIMs wife 5-7 years, son and fiance 1-3 years because having all of these "dangerous chemicals and precursers" ON THE PROPERTY constituted "evidence" that SWIM was engaged in the manufacture of dangerous drugs.

Count 1. manufacture of a dangerous drug, to whit, methamphetamine.
count 2. possession of chemicals and equiptment which could be used to manufacture said drug.
count 3. possession of a firearm while committing a drug offence
count 4. child abuse
count 5. child abuse
count 6. child abuse
count 7. possession of a dangerous drug-methamphetamine
count 8. possession of marijuana
count 9. possession of paraphenalia

SWIM beat them down to 5 years and SWIMs wife and family go free.

Only in America.

The moral of the story is that it doesn't matter what you have or why you have it, what it may or may not be for, or how good your explanations are, they will conform the evidence to fit the crime and you are guilty until you have enough money to prove your innocence.

[old hippie 56]

Hell Mick, your deal sounds kinda like swims, but they offer me 99 yrs. They even mentioned tacking RICO on to it. Got them down to 10.

[darawk]

Originally Posted by old hippie 56

Hell Mick, your deal sounds kinda like swims, but they offer me 99 yrs. They even mentioned tacking RICO on to it. Got them down to 10.

I've seen a few people make statements like this before about drug charges. And i'm not sure if you realize this, but the police will very often lie to you about what they can actually charge you with and what evidence they have. They have no legal obligation whatsoever to be truthful with you about that kind of thing. You should never trust what they tell you or are threatening to charge you with. People think that you just shouldn't talk without a lawyer present, but you also shouldn't believe anything you're told without a lawyer present who can tell you if it's bullshit or not. Interrogation is a mind-game that police are specially trained for, and they are extra-specially trained to make it seem like it isn't, like they're your friend and they are 'just letting you know' so you can make an 'informed' decision.

There was one particularly egregious case where a teenage girl was killed in her bedroom, and the police suspected that her brother killed her. They interrogated him for hours, told him that they had DNA evidence and that they knew and could conclusively prove that it was him and that if he signed a confession he'd get a lighter sentence. He finally confessed. They caught the real killer a couple of days later.


On the actual topic...as long as you do some extensive research about legitimate uses of the substances you are ordering, you can keep the DEA off your back if you're smart about it. Obviously you don't want to be ordering massive quantities of Safrole and methylamine together, as that would be rather tricky to justify. But if you order one, and a friend orders the other, that doesn't look quite so shady.

If I were to order such precursor chemicals, I would probably pre-conceive a valid reason for quickly using up however much of whatever I ordered. That way if the DEA comes around asking about it, I don't even have the stuff anymore and there is a legitimate reason why I shouldn't. Of course, I would keep the stuff somewhere safe, and voluntarily comply with any searches they wish to perform, just like any model sheepizen would.

Reputation Comments on this post:

	great quality posts so far, welcome!
	true, true

[zera]

Federal prosecutors are very very hard to fight. They're notorious for playing very dirty tricks to get one to back in the corner. One of their tactics is using all the federal acts involving derivative crimes to take down people by charging them with tons of charges. The example Mick posted where he received 8 charges was relatively lenient, many people get well over 100 charges for what really amounts to a single crime. They do this to intimidate the user and spin things to the grand jury and the press ("Well if he has 80 charges against him, he must be guility!").

Second the federal government well freeze your finances and seize your assets so you can't afford a lawyer. Even if they drop the charges often times they will keep the seize property, and no one well ever challenge them because they don't have the resources. Even without seized property the cost of a decent defense team will run you into the hundreds of thousands easily. Even if you beat the charges your reputation will be ruined, your life in shambles, you'll lose several years in the process and pretty much all your money.

Fair trial be damned, in America if you're accused of belonging to a group of "evil people" be it drug dealers, white collar criminals, terrorists or child pornographers your rights dissapear.

[mick mouse]

SWIM is Ex-con X 2 with extensive experience in both interrorgation and counter-interrorgation, courtesy of 12 years military service. SWIM didn't tell them jack. Cop claimed to have a confession, but in a previous court hearing, the attorneys (all 5 of them) cross-examined him and got him to admit that, while he had access to audio, video, and other officers to coroborate any "confession" , he deliberately chose not to employ them. Instead, he took notes, incorporated them into the police report and then destroyed the notes. Destruction of evidence? didn't matter, my word against his and he's the cop.

Originally Posted by darawk

I've seen a few people make statements like this before about drug charges. And i'm not sure if you realize this, but the police will very often lie to you about what they can actually charge you with and what evidence they have. They have no legal obligation whatsoever to be truthful with you about that kind of thing. You should never trust what they tell you or are threatening to charge you with. People think that you just shouldn't talk without a lawyer present, but you also shouldn't believe anything you're told without a lawyer present who can tell you if it's bullshit or not. Interrogation is a mind-game that police are specially trained for, and they are extra-specially trained to make it seem like it isn't, like they're your friend and they are 'just letting you know' so you can make an 'informed' decision.

There was one particularly egregious case where a teenage girl was killed in her bedroom, and the police suspected that her brother killed her. They interrogated him for hours, told him that they had DNA evidence and that they knew and could conclusively prove that it was him and that if he signed a confession he'd get a lighter sentence. He finally confessed. They caught the real killer a couple of days later.


On the actual topic...as long as you do some extensive research about legitimate uses of the substances you are ordering, you can keep the DEA off your back if you're smart about it. Obviously you don't want to be ordering massive quantities of Safrole and methylamine together, as that would be rather tricky to justify. But if you order one, and a friend orders the other, that doesn't look quite so shady.

If I were to order such precursor chemicals, I would probably pre-conceive a valid reason for quickly using up however much of whatever I ordered. That way if the DEA comes around asking about it, I don't even have the stuff anymore and there is a legitimate reason why I shouldn't. Of course, I would keep the stuff somewhere safe, and voluntarily comply with any searches they wish to perform, just like any model sheepizen would.

[mick mouse]

Hey, OH56! In Texas, they are still giving 10 to 1, aren't they? 99 and 10 work out the same! In Arizona, its straight 85% with the last 15 done as Community supervision. In SWIM's case, they were talking conspiracy and continuing criminal enterprise, but they knew it wouldn't float. They might as well of RICO'ed me, bastards cost me enough!

Originally Posted by old hippie 56

Hell Mick, your deal sounds kinda like swims, but they offer me 99 yrs. They even mentioned tacking RICO on to it. Got them down to 10.

[CrookedEye]

Only thing SWIM can say is:

They're right!!! In this day and age, your odds are even worse!!! Better have an extremely large amount of cash to even expect to be able to negotiate a lighter sentence....

[Nagognog2]

Person Bongo knows got it bargained to 5 years in a Federal Prison in Pennsylvania. His crime: After being badgered and harrassed to purchase large quantities of pot, he said, finally, that yes he would like to buy 100 pounds of pot for $100. BANG! Conspiracy to possess a controlled substance with intent to sell!

No money ever passed hands. No pot was ever produced. Just badgered and hassled by what turned out to be Federal agents. Bongo turned his situation into a hell of a radio program the night before he had to report to jail. He was given the prison cell G. Gordon Liddy had just vacated. Look him up.

[mick mouse]

Back on topic. SWIM doesn't know how other states are, but in AZ., there is NO valid or legal reason to possess precursers. RP is only used to cook dope or make explosives (both unlawful), more than a handful of 2% tincture of iodine bottles and you are cooking dope, No 7-10% Strong Iodine unless you own a ranch, the closest local town, Willcox, has just passed a town ordinance which allows the cops to get the sign-in logs recording PSE buys once a month, several other towns withih a 50 mile radius have the same law, ANY opened lithium batterys and you are cooking dope. This is according to Cochise County Sherriffs Office. The lists go on and on!

[darawk]

As long as you keep one important thing in mind you will never be caught, and that is: The police are not stupid. The problem I see with most people in committing any kind of crime is that they always underestimate the intelligence of the police. Ask yourself if you were a DEA inspector and had complete access to your own entire chemical/OTC product purchase history, would you believe your own story? If the answer is no, you need to write yourself a better story or get out of the drug manufacturing business before you get burned.

Create entire scripted interviews with a DEA agent. "Why do you have substance X?", "Ok, why couldn't you have used more common substance Y?", "Where did you hear that substance X was more effective than substance Y?", "Why did you need so much of it?", etc....

These are all questions that a mildly intelligent DEA agent would ask. Generally people only have a pre-conceived answer for the first one and just assume that if they have a seemingly legitimate reason for having the chemical then that's where the interview ends. Which is a massive assumption to make for something that could significantly affect the rest of your life.

It isn't all that hard really, and it is possible to create essentially perfect plausible deniability scenarios for everything you do. Receive a shipment of less-than-licit substances? Call the post office immediately and inform them that you received something you didn't order. Make a big fuss over it. In all likelihood, they'll do absolutely nothing about it. But when the feds come knocking at your door, you'll be able to explain to them that you didn't actually order this stuff, don't know what it is, and have only kept it here because you hope one day to return it to it's intended recipient. Refer them to the post office you called as proof.

You have to think and act exactly like a person who has nothing to do with drugs and who is just receiving some random package with an unmarked powder/liquid/whatever in it. What would that kind of person do? And more importantly, why?

[bewilderment]

Wow, all of that over such pitiful evidence?? Man...my cousin was a drug mule smuggling heroin from Colombia to NY and distributing around the east coast and made off with a sentence of merely 5 years...although I can't recall the amount they found in his stomach but it wasn't a small amount or else he wouldn't have been taking the risk. He says he's been on good behavior (but I don't really know, he always lied a lot) but he's ended up serving his entire time and should be getting out sometime soon as he was arrested back in 2002. He's been up north, first imprisoned in NY and later transferred to MA and never received any visits from his family who lives down in the SE region of the U.S.

[Fresh]

Innocent until proven guilty. I think it's highly unlikely that a person would be buying ALL the chemicals needed to make pcp just randomly though.

[AntiAimer]

Actually it's, guilty until proven innocent, least to me. All I know is, from reading some of what was said....never ever get chemicals sent to your house...never ever throw evidence in the trash(BURN IT!!!!). The cop will most likely lie and just say the trash can was knocked over. Also, never confess, thats major evidence against yourself. No matter what they say, there not your friends...all they see is $$ at the end of the tunnel and want to make it as easy as possible to get to that tunnel. Sucks man, G/L.

[Fresh]

Yea, agreed... I said that comment half jokingly, even though that's "how it's 'sposed ta be." You'd be pretty stupid to order chemicals to the house you plan on cooking meth in if you asked me. You would think people would know that, but hey, maybe they're trippin out.

[AntiAimer]

Originally Posted by Fresh

Yea, agreed... I said that comment half jokingly, even though that's "how it's 'sposed ta be." You'd be pretty stupid to order chemicals to the house you plan on cooking meth in if you asked me. You would think people would know that, but hey, maybe they're trippin out.

Alot of dumb people out there, you would think they wouldn't use a credit card to order them...but they do.

[Riconoen {UGC}]

swim's never had a problem ordering grey-area chemicals online with his credit card.