Roomate-->Cocaine

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Ex-Bluelighter
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My roomate next year is planning on coming back to college with a few ounces of cocaine and the intention to sell it. I don't know how much exactly; he got some great price and "Can't pass it up." I think for now he's planning on two ounces to "See how it sells."

Now, personally, I think he's almost garunteed to get caught. I want nothing, I mean nothing, to do with it. It's bad enough, in my opinion, that I even know that this is his plan.

Anyway, my question is: if he gets busted how much trouble am I in? Obviously we would agree ahead of time to just deny that I had any knowledge of this at all. But do you think they will buy it? Would they search my room? If they found coke in my room, would they be able to tell it was from his stash? If they do buy that I had no idea, would I still be in trouble?
 
well, its tricky. they may watch him, therefore you aswell, for awhile before busting him. thus you'd be hard pressed to deffend yourself if infact they do see you hanging around him a lot when he's doin business.
also, if they find him selling coke, they can then search your house.
i'm not a lawyer, just my opinion, but you'd get in to pretty big trouble.
 
Yes, you can get into trouble. The fact that its a dorm subjects you to the school's rules as well. If, for example, I were in a room where someone else had alcohol or marijuana--knowingly that is--then I would be in just as much trouble as if I were drinking underage or smoking the weed. It depends on your school's policy.

If you knew what was going on as well, and by not telling anyone about it, or in fact lying about your knowledge of the drugs, you could be charged with conspiracy to sell/distribute cocaine.

I would make it crystal clear that you do not want to be part of this and that you will not live with someone who is going to be selling drugs. Sure, it's his ass that's mostly on the line, but why would you even want to risk getting yourself into trouble? You have the option to control your life. Make an active decision to either ensure he doesn't bring coke into the room or get a new roommmate. Seriously.
 
Dr. J said:
If you knew what was going on as well, and by not telling anyone about it, or in fact lying about your knowledge of the drugs, you could be charged with conspiracy to sell/distribute cocaine.
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To clarify

Dorm rules aside, mere knowledge of or silence concerning a crime being committed by someone near you, or who lives with you, or who is a friend of yours, is NOT enough to get you convicted of conspiracy, or anything else for that matter.

For conspiracy, there needs to be an agreement to commit the crime. For something like aiding and abetting, there needs to be some active participation. You could be an accessory after the fact as well, if you participate in covering it up or help the person get away (hence the relevance of the lying point).

That said, for entirely practical purposes, I agree with this:

Dr. J said:
I would make it crystal clear that you do not want to be part of this and that you will not live with someone who is going to be selling drugs. Sure, it's his ass that's mostly on the line, but why would you even want to risk getting yourself into trouble? You have the option to control your life. Make an active decision to either ensure he doesn't bring coke into the room or get a new roommmate. Seriously.
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Being a roommate of a dealer, it would be very easy to the cops to claim you participated somehow, or helped hide it. At the very least, you subject yourself to the risk of being searched, or perhaps arrested, if not convicted.

Also, they could charge you with possession if they could show you exercised some dominion/control over the drugs somehow. That's a close call when both roommates have access to the drugs. BUT if your roomate locked up the drugs in a place where you couldn't get to them, that would help prevent a possession charge against you.
 
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Well speaking from experience.

On a college campus, he will get caught eventually it is only a matter of time. Someone will say something, and it will branch out from there.

Getting caught at college is even worse just for the shear fact that you not only deal with all the legal ramifications that you would anyway, but you will most certainly at LEAST lose your housing if not get expelled completely.
 
I was in a similar situation, I needed a place to crash for 2-3 months and I moved into a dealers house. Really nice guy, was always offering me shit and was able to get just about anything. It was tough to wander to the shower at 6:00am for work and have 4-5 people still up and partying.

We got along fine but when I told him I was moving out, he was surprised. I was upfront and honest and told him I had too much to lose if he went down. I mean I don't mind taking risks now and then but this was too much.

As others noted, life in college dorms is fun but everyone knows everybodys business. Get another living situation.
 
When I was a sophomore in college, I lived in an apartment with a dealer who was an ex-con (did time for murder in fact). The guy was a real redneck, from the deep dark woods of southern Virginia. He routinely sold a wide variety of drugs to the local high school kids (including his own anti-psychotic meds, of which he had an abundance).

I was sufficiently stupid at the time so that I did not worry about what might happen to me if he got busted. But my name was on the lease, and the dude frequently neglected to pay me his share of the rent. I bugged him about it fairly often until one day he snapped, went for me, and got ahold of my throat.

Sometimes real-life dangers are larger than hypothetical ones. So much for living with dealers...
 
Mahan Atma said:
To clarify

Dorm rules aside, mere knowledge of or silence concerning a crime being committed by someone near you, or who lives with you, or who is a friend of yours, is NOT enough to get you convicted of conspiracy, or anything else for that matter.

For conspiracy, there needs to be an agreement to commit the crime. For something like aiding and abetting, there needs to be some active participation. You could be an accessory after the fact as well, if you participate in covering it up or help the person get away (hence the relevance of the lying point).

That said, for entirely practical purposes, I agree with this:



Being a roommate of a dealer, it would be very easy to the cops to claim you participated somehow, or helped hide it. At the very least, you subject yourself to the risk of being searched, or perhaps arrested, if not convicted.

Also, they could charge you with possession if they could show you exercised some dominion/control over the drugs somehow. That's a close call when both roommates have access to the drugs. BUT if your roomate locked up the drugs in a place where you couldn't get to them, that would help prevent a possession charge against you.
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I think I will jump into this matter.

"Conspiracy" generally involves two or more individuals discussing aka. "conspiring" to engage in criminal activity. Also, at least one of the conspirators must take action towards the initiation or furtherance of the crime in question.

In this matter the parties involved have clearly discussed the criminal activity to be engaged in. In fact, the guest stated the roommate was "planning " to purchase and transport 2 ozs. of illegal drugs to a school campus.

The key factor here in determining whether a conspiracy is present, depends upon whether your penal code defines such as active participation or implicit participation.

EG., it is quite possible for two indivs. to merely discuss the commission of criminal activity and for one of the individuals involved to engage in an action towards the commission of the discussed crime and for the other individual to be merely aware of the action of the other to be guilty of conspiracy.

The "agreement" to commit the crime does not necessarily have to exist at the time of the discussion of the crime. The "agreement" can be formed at any point in time of the commission of the criminal activity.

EG, two people are driving around and one person says "hey, let's go rob Mahan!", the other person states "No, he never has any money anyway". Then the driver spots Mahan and jumps out and commences to rob him. The passenger is like, "Well maybe I should help rob him". Arguably, at that point in time the passenger is guilty of conspiracy as well as robbery.

In relation to the guest's thread, if he at any point acts in furtherance of the crime, is potentially guilty of conspiracy.

Thus, as Dr. J indicated, the guest "could be charged with conspiracy".
 
PottedMeat said:
I think I will jump into this matter.

"Conspiracy" generally involves two or more individuals discussing aka. "conspiring" to engage in criminal activity. Also, at least one of the conspirators must take action towards the initiation or furtherance of the crime in question.

In this matter the parties involved have clearly discussed the criminal activity to be engaged in. In fact, the guest stated the roommate was "planning " to purchase and transport 2 ozs. of illegal drugs to a school campus.

The key factor here in determining whether a conspiracy is present, depends upon whether your penal code defines such as active participation or implicit participation.

EG., it is quite possible for two indivs. to merely discuss the commission of criminal activity and for one of the individuals involved to engage in an action towards the commission of the discussed crime and for the other individual to be merely aware of the action of the other to be guilty of conspiracy.

The "agreement" to commit the crime does not necessarily have to exist at the time of the discussion of the crime. The "agreement" can be formed at any point in time of the commission of the criminal activity.

EG, two people are driving around and one person says "hey, let's go rob Mahan!", the other person states "No, he never has any money anyway". Then the driver spots Mahan and jumps out and commences to rob him. The passenger is like, "Well maybe I should help rob him". Arguably, at that point in time the passenger is guilty of conspiracy as well as robbery.

In relation to the guest's thread, if he at any point acts in furtherance of the crime, is potentially guilty of conspiracy.

Thus, as Dr. J indicated, the guest "could be charged with conspiracy".
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I disagree. Conspiracy requires more than just "discussing" a crime, it requires an agreement. It's black letter law, straight out of Black's Law dictionary:

Conspiracy - An agreement by two or more persons to commit an unlawful act.

Or see, e.g.: http://www.duhaime.org/dictionary/dict-c.htm

In fact at common law, both actors must have two levels of intent: 1) The intent to agree; and 2) the intent that the crime be committed.

In this case, the poster has neither the intent to agree, nor the intent that the crime be committed.
 
^^^
Yeah...perhaps you should read my post again.

I am pretty sure I mentioned the term "agreement".
 
Just to clarify, I'll be living in an apartment next year, not the dorms. And this guy is one of my best friends, so trying to kill me isn't an issue.

I'm also concerned for the well-being of the other roomates who actually don't know about his plan. Even if I could ditch out on the lease (which I can't), there's still their legal well-being. If I and the other roomates are at serious risk should he get caught, I might be able to convince him not to go through with this. But otherwise, it will be difficult.

Also, he has tried to get me to go in with him a bunch of times. I always tell him no, but does that make a difference? And, I kinda thought about buying from him. If he goes down, and I am buying from him, will they treat me like they would any of his clients? or would I be subject to harsher penalties?
 
guest said:
Just to clarify, I'll be living in an apartment next year, not the dorms. And this guy is one of my best friends, so trying to kill me isn't an issue.

I'm also concerned for the well-being of the other roomates who actually don't know about his plan. Even if I could ditch out on the lease (which I can't), there's still their legal well-being. If I and the other roomates are at serious risk should he get caught, I might be able to convince him not to go through with this. But otherwise, it will be difficult.

Also, he has tried to get me to go in with him a bunch of times. I always tell him no, but does that make a difference? And, I kinda thought about buying from him. If he goes down, and I am buying from him, will they treat me like they would any of his clients? or would I be subject to harsher penalties?
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Again, there is the issue of what is technically legal, and there is the question of what will happen in the real world.

First, from a purely academic/technical standpoint -- if you buy from him, you're still not guilty of conspiracy to distribute. However, you absolutely increase the likelihood of suffering harsh penalties. If both of you are busted, it makes it a lot easier for the government to try to turn you into a witness against him -- and to do that, they will want to put pressure on you by threatening you with heavy penalties.

Second, you increase the chances that you'll inadvertently do something that could be construed as furthering his distribution crimes. Even if you do not explicitly enter into an agreement to distribute, if you further his crimes then an agreement could be inferred.

Please realize that, as explained above, even if you are never convicted of distribution or conspiracy (and I still maintain that I am right about that), he is subjecting you to having your apartment searched, and possibly your being arrested. I don't know if you've ever had your home searched, but it isn't very pleasant. Neither is spending a few nights in jail, having to hire a lawyer, etc. etc.

My personal (not legal) advice to you is to convince him he cannot deal coke out of your apartment, and if you cannot that, that he must move out of the apartment. If your name is on the lease, you have that right, and you should insist on it.

Second, if you absolutely positively cannot achieve that, you should absolutely and positively see to it that he CONFINES his activities to his OWN ROOM in the apartment. ALL his drug dealing activities should take place in his own room, and he would keep the door LOCKED at all times. (Any halfway sensible dealer would probably do that anyway).

If you do not have access to the drugs, that would make it a lot harder for the police to connect you to anything he does.

Also, if you are not a witness to anything he does, that will make it less likely that the police will try to turn you into one and use you against him. So you can tell him it's for his own good, if that will help.
 
Thank you so much for your advice. That makes a lot of sense. I'm going to try to convince him not to do it.
 
guest said:
Thank you so much for your advice. That makes a lot of sense. I'm going to try to convince him not to do it.
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You're welcome, and good luck.
 
If it is just the one batch, i think your way overly paranoid. however, its not just weed, and it is on a campus. That sounds stupid.
 
While you may not go to jail, it certainly won't be something you want to go through, parents and school thining you're a drug dealer will not go down well. Getting charged even if you do not get convicted is also something you don't want to wear if you didn't have any part in the matter.

If he wants to deal tell him to move out unless you are 100% ok with it but by the sounds of it you aren't.
 
You and your buddy should have a serious financial discussion. Let's say he can make 5k on the total sale. If he is busted, a good lawyer will cost at least double that and all his career prospects post college are going to be lost. Too little money for too much risk. Also, just remember that if you live there people will be calling and coming over at all hours to score coke. Word travels fast and this is a recipe for disaster.
 
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