Gorsuch blasts Supreme Court majority in drug trafficking case

Justice Neil Gorsuch on Thursday chastised the Supreme Court majority for ruling against a drug defendant, arguing the decision gives the government too much prosecutorial power.

Delilah Guadalupe Diaz appealed to the courts after a jury convicted her of importing methamphetamine across the southern U.S. border, a charge that requires the government to prove Diaz knowingly transported the drug.

Diaz, who claims she was a blind mule and was unaware of the drugs in her car, argued that federal rules of evidence do not allow prosecutors to call their witness to testify expert told jurors that most couriers know they are carrying illegal drugs.

In a 6-3 decision Thursday, the Supreme Court rejected Diaz's appeal. Justice Clarence Thomas' majority opinion was joined by liberal Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson and four other conservatives: Chief Justice John Roberts, Justice Samuel Alito, Justice Brett Kavanaugh and Justice Amy Coney Barrett.

Gorsuch, former President Trump's first appointee to the Court, who has at times broken with his conservative colleagues to side with the defendants, did so again Thursday, saying the expert's testimony was inadmissible.

“The result? The government walks away with a powerful new tool in its pocket,” Gorsuch wrote, joined by liberal Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan.

“Prosecutors can now bring in an expert – someone who apparently has the practical ability to read minds – and let him explain what “most” people like the defendant think when they commit an act prohibited by the law,” he continued. “Then all the government has to do is ask the jury to find that the defendant is like 'most' people and convict him. »

The case revolved around a federal rule of evidence prescribing that expert witnesses “shall not express an opinion as to whether or not the defendant suffered from a mental state or condition that constitutes an element of the crime charged.”

Thomas found that the rule did not prohibit the testimony of the expert in the Diaz case, a special agent with the Department of Homeland Security, because they were not expressing an opinion about Diaz herself, but only about drug traffickers in general.

“An expert's conclusion that 'most people' in a group have a particular mental state does not constitute an opinion about 'the accused,'” Thomas wrote.

Gorsuch lamented in his dissent, “It is anyone's guess what authority exists to authorize this kind of charade in federal criminal trials, but it certainly cannot be found in Rule 704.”

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