Abuelhawa v. United States

Abuelhawa v. United States
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued March 4, 2009 Decided May 26, 2009
Full case name	Salman Khade Abuelhawa, petitioner v. United States
Docket no.	08-192
Citations	556 U.S. 816 (more) 129 S. Ct. 2102; 173 L. Ed. 2d 982
Case history
Prior	Petitioner convicted, 1:07-cr-00018-LMB (E.D. Va. 2007); affirmed, 523 F.3d 415 (4th Cir. 2008).
Holding
A person who uses a cell phone to buy drugs solely for personal use (a misdemeanor) cannot be charged with the separate crime of using a phone to facilitate the sale of drugs (a felony).
Court membership
Chief Justice John Roberts Associate Justices John P. Stevens · Antonin Scalia Anthony Kennedy · David Souter Clarence Thomas · Ruth Bader Ginsburg Stephen Breyer · Samuel Alito
Case opinion
Majority	Souter, joined by unanimous
Laws applied
21 U.S.C. § 843(b); 21 U.S.C. § 844(a)

Abuelhawa v. United States, 556 U.S. 816 (2009), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court held that a defendant who used a cellphone for the misdemeanor purchase of cocaine could not be charged with a felony for using a "communication facility" to facilitate the distribution of an illegal drug under 21 U.S.C. § 843(b). In a unanimous opinion delivered by Justice Souter, the Court reasoned that the Government's interpretation of "facilitate" exposed a first-time buyer using a phone "to punishment 12 times more severe than a purchase by a recidivist offender and 8 times more severe than the unauthorized possession of a drug used by rapists," and was clearly not in line with Congress's intent, since it conflicted with the classification of the drug sale itself as a misdemeanor.

External links

• Text of Abuelhawa v. United States, 556 U.S. 816 (2009) is available from: CourtListener  Google Scholar  Justia  Oyez (oral argument audio)  Supreme Court (slip opinion) (archived) 
• Text of appealed-from opinion by the Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit