United States v. Dale Alan Johnson

On October 26, 2002, Appellant Dale Alan Johnson (“Johnson”) was convicted by a jury of possession with intent to distribute methamphetamine. During trial, Johnson moved for acquittal pursuant to Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 29. The district court denied the motion. At sentencing, Johnson objected to the pre-sentence investigator’s base offense level calculation on the ground that it included approximately 80.9 grams of methamphetamine that Johnson never actually possessed. The district court disagreed with Johnson’s objection and adopted the pre-sentence investigator’s recommendation. Johnson now appeals. We have jurisdiction pursuant to 18 U.S.C. § 3231 . We affirm.

I. BACKGROUND

On October 25, 2001, a detective with the San Bernardino, California, Sheriffs Office was performing random checks at a FedEx facility in San Bernardino. Employing certain criteria, he looked for packages which might contain illegal drugs. A package addressed to Johnson in Butte, Montana, met some of the criteria. It was placed on the floor, along with other packages, for examination by a drug-detection dog. The dog alerted on Johnson’s package, so the detective obtained a search…