A Strong Case For Legalizing Marijuana

Should untrained citizens conduct the dangerous and otherwise illegal activity of police-informants? At the time, I had no idea that I would eventually leave government service for academia. This change came about for a variety of reasons, and most had nothing to do with the FBI. But I did leave the FBI with vague concerns about the scope of law enforcement power.

Upon arriving at the University of Virginia, then, there was little doubt that my work would in some way be an attempt to make sense of my concerns as an FBI agent.

Consider the case, Alexander v. But confidential informants often agree to engage in risky undercover work in exchange for leniency, and we cannot think of any reason, especially any reason rooted in constitutional text or doctrine, for creating a categorical prohibition against the informant's incurring a cost that takes a different form from the usual risk of being beaten up or for that matter bumped off by a drug dealer with whom one is negotiating a purchase or sale of drugs in the hope of obtaining lenient treatment from the government.

Informants are motivated by all sorts of reasons; for example, some have a strong sense of patriotism and simply want to help the A Strong Case For Legalizing Marijuana. But consider the more limited case of informants who are tasked by the police to engage read article risky undercover operations when the police have leverage over the informant e. This has led me to the view that the underlying principles of the legal doctrine of unconscionability provide weight in determining the extent to which these informant-police agreements are justified. One need not be committed to the idea that informant-police agreements give rise to legally enforceable contracts. This is because the bargaining process raises other normative principles—which have weight—underpinning the doctrine of unconscionability.

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Principles are not dispositive in the cases to which they apply. Competing principles may be incommensurate, requiring that cases to which they apply are resolved based upon justificatory weight. Although the doctrine of unconscionability might not resolve informant-police agreements, its underlying normative principles might provide weight with respect to those agreements. With respect to the procedural component, police hold almost all the power over informants and can implicitly A Strong Case For Legalizing Marijuana informants with a complete loss of liberty prison. Moreover, untrained informants are often unable to appreciate the risks and contingences that come with dangerous law enforcement operations.

One might ask the following question with respect to the substantive component: Should untrained citizens conduct the risk-laden, otherwise illegal activity of police, as required by some informant-police agreements?

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There are a variety of ways that informant-police agreements may count as an affront to one or more of these facets. She was potentially liable for felony charges and prison, and the police offered to consider reducing her liability in exchange for her meeting two convicted felons alone in her car to buy 2. The police provided Hoffman with a recording device, transmitter, and cash to purchase the drugs and the gun. However, on the day of the sting, the targets changed the meeting location and the police lost track of Hoffman. Two days later she was found dead—having been shot by the gun she was sent to buy. Was the A Strong Case For Legalizing Marijuana between the police and Hoffman justified? Did she have adequate knowledge of the risks involved?

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These are of course difficult questions, but I think an examination of the procedural https://modernalternativemama.com/wp-content/custom/critical-thinking/sustainable-fashion.php substantive components of informant-police agreements can be illuminating. Just as all contracts are not unconscionable, it would not be right to say that all informant-police agreements are unconscionable. Unfortunately, unenforceability is often not a viable remedy in the case of informant-police agreements. This lends support to the view that facially unconscionable informant-police agreements should be construed as unjustified from the outset—and our policing policies should be crafted accordingly.

After graduating from law school, he was a law clerk for a federal judge in Abingdon, VA. Love the iai? Sign up to get exclusive access. Your Email Address.]