Source: cases/21usc841/f3d-767-453-us-v-teran-salas.case
Case source: https://www.neochart.com/catalog/cases/f3d/volume_767/0453_01/index.html
Under the federal scheme, any administering of a controlled substance that falls under the federal definition for “dispense” must be “by, or pursuant to the lawful order of, a practitioner.”
Under the Controlled Substances Act, it is "unlawful for any person knowingly or intentionally ... to manufacture, distribute, or dispense, or possess with intent to manufacture, distribute, or dispense, a controlled substance.” 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1). This wording tracks the relevant parts of the guidelines definition for “drug trafficking offense.”
It is not a realistic probability that someone would engage in medical care or research that involved administering cocaine in such amounts.
We hold that the district court was correct in determining that Teran-Salas’s Texas conviction was both a drug trafficking offense and an aggravated felony.
casedsl 1 case /f3d/767/0453-01 name United States v. Teran-Salas cite 767 F.3d 453 (2014) court United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit date 2014-09-15 url catalog/cases/f3d/volume_767/0453_01/index.html source ir/caselaw/f3d_767.jsonl sha1=8d7fc13ad3ed9e3425a708cfe2a7733180df3297 chars=20784 law 21usc841 (a)(1) role comparator posture criminal; sentencing appeal after guilty plea to illegal reentry (8 U.S.C. § 1326); defendant challenges 16-level "drug trafficking offense" enhancement and "aggravated felony" finding based on a prior Texas possession-with-intent-to-deliver conviction; § 841(a)(1) is only the federal comparator result not-decided element x-categorical-match : satisfied [law] variant state-predicate-matches-federal-offence/overbreadth-only-theoretical-no-realistic-probability count prior Texas conviction, Tex. Health & Safety Code § 481.112(a) possession with intent to deliver theory categorical comparison to the federal distribute/dispense definition fact @772..886 [supports] | It identified a 2011 Texas conviction for possession with intent to deliver between four and 200 grams of cocaine. fact @8226..8358 [cuts-against] | Accordingly, one can possess with the intent to deliver by possessing with the intent to either distribute, dispense, or administer. fact @16218..16356 [supports absent] | Like the defendants in Ruiz-Sanchez and Villedar-Mejia, Teran-Salas does not identify any case that applied § 481.112(a) in such a manner. rule @9699..9889 | Under the federal scheme, any administering of a controlled substance that falls under the federal definition for “dispense” must be “by, or pursuant to the lawful order of, a practitioner.” rule @18669..19020 | Under the Controlled Substances Act, it is "unlawful for any person knowingly or intentionally ... to manufacture, distribute, or dispense, or possess with intent to manufacture, distribute, or dispense, a controlled substance.” 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1). This wording tracks the relevant parts of the guidelines definition for “drug trafficking offense.” held @16953..17093 | It is not a realistic probability that someone would engage in medical care or research that involved administering cocaine in such amounts. held @17534..17690 | We hold that the district court was correct in determining that Teran-Salas’s Texas conviction was both a drug trafficking offense and an aggravated felony. gloss Texas "deliver" includes "administer" by a practitioner's agent in the practitioner's presence without a "lawful order", which is theoretically broader than federal "dispense"; but with no Texas prosecution on an administering theory, and 4-200 g of cocaine being implausible as medical administration, the state offence is treated as a match. The aggravated-felony limb runs through 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(2) to "felony punishable under the Controlled Substances Act", i.e. § 841(a)(1). element intent-to-distribute : not-reached gloss No § 841 charge; the scope of federal "distribute or dispense" is construed only as the generic yardstick for the state offence (see x-categorical-match). element act.dispense : not-reached gloss The court restates the § 802(10) definition (delivery by or pursuant to the lawful order of a practitioner, including administering) but applies it to no conduct. element possession : not-reached element knowledge : not-reached misfit `role comparator` now says the case is not an instance of § 841 (nobody is charged under it), but not WHAT is measured against it. § 841(a)(1) (via the Guidelines' "drug trafficking offense" definition and the INA "aggravated felony" chain 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(43)(B) -> 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(2) -> CSA) serves as the generic federal offence against which a STATE statute's elements are compared. The compared law and that chain live only in `count`/`theory`/gloss text, and the comparison itself is still an ad-hoc x-categorical-match element. misfit Under the categorical approach the defendant's actual conduct is legally irrelevant, so there are no real-world `fact` lines; the "facts" are the record of conviction and the content of state law, and their polarity means "towards / away from a categorical match", not conduct. The holding compares element sets (Texas deliver = distribute|dispense|administer vs federal distribute|dispense), an element-to-element relation across two laws. misfit `result` has no natural value: the prosecution won the sentencing issue, but the claim "under THIS statute" does not exist; not-decided is used. misfit Burden allocation is the crux (defendant must point to an actual state case showing a "realistic probability" of non-generic application); burden-shifting cannot be expressed. misfit The direct object of interpretation is U.S.S.G. § 2L1.2 commentary and 21 U.S.C. § 802(10) (definition of "dispense"), not § 841's text; the opinion says only in a footnote that § 841(a)(1)'s wording "tracks" the Guidelines definition.