noting that the “literal meaning of the legislature’s adulterant and dilutant definition is that any substance that is added to or mixed with a controlled substance, regardless of when, how, or why that substance was added, may be added to the aggregate weight of the controlled substance as an adulterant or dilutant”
How later courts described this case
- noting that the “literal meaning of the legislature’s adulterant and dilutant definition is that any substance that is added to or mixed with a controlled substance, regardless of when, how, or why that substance was added, may be added to the aggregate weight of the controlled substance as an adulterant or dilutant”
- explaining that definition includes any substance added to or mixed with a controlled substance
- concluding blood found mixed with methamphetamine in a vial was properly included in aggregate weight as adulterant or dilutant
- overruling the requirement “that the State prove intent to increase the bulk or quantity of the controlled substance”
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
WOMACK, J.,
concurring opinion, in which KELLER, P.J., and MEYERS, J., joined.
I join the Court’s opinion. This Court’s ill-considered definitions of the statutory term “adulterants or dilutants” * led to the enactment of the Legislature’s ill-considered definition in its next session. Of *423 course, this Court had no authority to in-, vent a definition that was not based on the meaning of the statutory language, while the Seventy-third Legislature had every authority to enact a definition that put an end to this Court’s adventure in writing statutes. ' :
I agree that we have a duty to interpret and apply that definition according to its language, which is clear. Only our obligations to uphold the constitutions could override that duty. There is no constitutional question in this case, in my view. But the statutory definition may be so inclusive as to invite constitutional problems.
For example, it is no rarity for suspects to attempt to flush controlled substances down the toilet. For that reason, officers who are executing a search warrant frequently assign one person to secure the bathroom immediately. I would hate to see this Court forced to hold the statute unconstitutional when a prosecutor tried to include all the water in the toilet bowl as part of the controlled substance.
But a prosecutor might. This case is before us today because a prosecutor tried to include the appellant’s blood as part of the controlled substance. Whether that is what the statute should allow is a question for the legislature. I agree that, as it stands now, the statute does allow a prosecutor to do it, and the constitutions do not forbid it.