Pennsylvania overdose death prosecutions target fellow drug users instead of high-level dealers

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court declined to add new legal protections for defendants accused of providing drugs that caused a deadly overdose, reported The Associated Press and SpotlightPA.

The decision from the state’s highest court addressed a frequent criticism of overdose death prosecutions in Pennsylvania: that they target fellow drug users instead of high-level dealers.

In a majority opinion issued Tuesday, justices upheld convictions in two separate drug delivery resulting in death cases, saying state law has a broad definition of “delivery” and “does not differentiate between drug dealers and co-users for purposes of delivery of illegal narcotics.”

Despite ruling against the defendants, Justice Daniel McCaffery said the court “cannot ignore the fact that” the “proposed defense makes sense — some believe drug dealers should be punished more harshly than drug users.”

“Nevertheless, this type of policy determination is for the General Assembly, not the courts,” McCaffery added.

Justices Christine Donohue, Kevin Dougherty, Sallie Updyke Mundy, and P. Kevin Brobson joined that majority opinion.

In a concurring opinion, Justice David Wecht also distinguished between the roles of justices and state lawmakers.

“The General Assembly does not violate the Constitution when it violates common sense,” Wecht said. “It is undoubtedly true that the DDRD statute was meant to target drug dealers, not drug users,” he continued, referring to drug delivery resulting in death.

But Wecht said “the spirit of the law is in considerable tension with its text” and “it is the latter that binds us.” Chief Justice Debra Todd joined his concurring opinion.

Spotlight PA reported on the two cases earlier this year that highlighted the emotionally charged issue in Pennsylvania, where supplying drugs in fatal overdoses has led to hundreds of state prison sentences.

Pennsylvania is known as a national leader for bringing this type of criminal charge, but prosecution rates vary widely between counties and grieving families are divided over whether these prosecutions do more harm than good, Spotlight PA has found. Supporters say these cases bring needed accountability, while critics say the fear of spending decades in prison discourages people from calling for help if someone overdoses.

Cases with a drug delivery resulting in death charge, which carries a maximum prison sentence of 40 years, were filed more than 680 times from 2021 through 2025.

The two cases before the state Supreme Court focused on the question of what happens when people “jointly and constructively acquire and use drugs.” Justices considered whether that should be a defense for drug delivery resulting in death charges and similar offenses — and if so, whether that’s sufficient for an acquittal or entitles the defense to a jury instruction that addresses the issue of joint possession.

Both cases, which were consolidated together for Pennsylvania Supreme Court arguments, involved prosecutions that occurred in York County.

York County District Attorney Tim Barker previously told Spotlight PA the evidence in the cases went “well beyond any characterization of a minimal ‘sharing’ of drugs.” Barker described how the office seeks “rehabilitation and diversion where appropriate,” but “will always seek accountability for criminal conduct that harms victims, especially when the actions cause the death of another.”

Anthony Tambourino, an attorney for the defendants, had advocated for recognizing the “common sense reality” of how people use drugs and said the drug delivery resulting in death law was “not meant to criminalize every drug handoff among co-users.”

Tambourino works for the York County Office of Conflict Counsel, which serves clients who can’t be represented by the local public defender’s office due to a conflict of interest. He has emphasized “that my views on the matter are my own and not reflective of” the county government.

C. Melissa Owen, an attorney and president of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, was disappointed with the court’s decision.

“It is unthinkable that joint drug use can be made a homicide,” she told Spotlight PA. “We anticipate this ruling will further discourage individuals from seeking help during an overdose, causing the very harm the law purports to prevent.”

Pastefforts to limit the use of drug delivery resulting charges have not gone far in the state legislature. Some bills currently pending in the General Assembly would give prosecutors more time to file these charges.

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Florida man executed, he killed his cellmate to get the death penalty

 The 31st  Execution of 2026

A Florida prisoner, James Robertson, 63, who said he killed his cellmate specifically to get on death row was executed October 13, 2026, nearly 18 years after the attack, reported The Associated Press.

James Robertson, 63, declined to offer any last words before receiving a three-drug injection and was pronounced dead about 10 minutes later. It was a stark contrast to the failed execution of Christa Pike in Tennessee two weeks ago, where she was rushed to the hospital after surviving two lethal doses of pentobarbital.

Robertson’s execution, the first in Florida since Pike, comes at a time of escalating attention on the death penalty in the United States. The Pentagon said last week that it would livestream the firing squad execution of Fort Hood shooter Nidal Malik Hasan, drawing criticism from both Republican and Democratic lawmakers.

“Florida has a sound lethal injection process and protocol,” Jordan Kirkland, a state Department of Corrections spokesperson, said at a news conference before the execution. Although he couldn’t speak to Tennessee’s lethal injection procedure, he said Florida would make sure its process was “humane and dignified.”

Florida executes people by injecting them with a sedative, a paralytic, and a drug that stops the heart, according to the Department of Corrections.

Robertson wanted to be executed

Robertson had pleaded guilty to first-degree murder for strangling Frank Hart while he slept in 2008, and waived all appeals. He told investigators that he did it so he wouldn’t have to live out his days in prison.

Hart was killed just eight days before he was due to be released, his daughter, Rebecca Hart, told reporters at Florida State Prison. She stressed that her father was not just a piece of Robertson’s story. “When someone you love is taken from you in such a violent way, the world keeps moving, even when a part of yours feels like it has stopped,” she read. “Other people go on with their lives, but you carry your loss into every tomorrow.”

Robertson was 17 years old when he went to prison in 1980 for burglary and assault. Years of convictions for escape, battery and weapons while in prison kept adding time to his total sentence. Hart had been sent to prison in 2003 following a sexual battery conviction.

A rare reprieve leaves another Florida prisoner on death row

Robertson was supposed to be one of two executions carried out by Florida on Tuesday, but Gov. Ron DeSantis withdrew a death warrant last week for William Lee Thompson. The Republican governor did not provide a reason but had temporarily stayed the execution last month pending a psychiatric evaluation.

Records show this was the first time DeSantis withdrew a death warrant. Thompson, 74, will remain on death row, and a new death warrant could be signed in the future. His attorneys say he has dementia and failing health, and they want him transferred to a medical facility.

DeSantis is the third Florida governor to sign a death warrant for Thompson. Bob Graham and Bob Martinez both scheduled executions for Thompson in the 1980s, but years of appeals and stays allowed him to avoid the electric chair, the state’s method of execution at the time.

Thompson was convicted of first-degree murder, kidnapping and sexual battery in the 1976 killing of 23-year-old Sally Ivester.

Florida has the nation’s busiest death chamber

DeSantis oversaw 19 executions in 2025, more than any other Florida governor in a single year since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976. Robertson was the state’s 17th execution of 2026, with two more already scheduled, not counting Thompson.

DeSantis, who leaves office in January, has made few public comments about the unprecedented number of executions but explained previously that his goal is to bring justice to victims’ families who have waited decades for the death sentences to be carried out.

William Reaves, 77, is scheduled to be executed on Oct. 20, followed by Jesse Guardado, 64, on Nov. 5. Reaves was convicted of fatally shooting a deputy after dropping a gun in front of the law enforcement officer in 1986. Guardado was convicted of robbing and killing a woman in order to buy drugs in 2004.

A total of 47 people were executed in the U.S. in 2025. Besides leading all other states last year, Florida has carried out more than half the 31 total executions in the U.S. so far this year. In July, Florida executed two prisoners in one day, the first state in nearly a decade to do so.

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ALARM: Trump's FBI searched home of Congresswoman and political opponent three weeks before election

In a statement on X on Monday, Congresswoman Omar called the search an “attempt to target political enemies and weaponize federal law enforcement.”

Federal agents on Monday searched the home of Democratic U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar, a startling escalation in a criminal investigation that brings renewed focus to the frequent target of Trump administration derision in the final weeks of her reelection bid, reported The Associated Press.

The search of the Minnesota congresswoman’s home so close to next month’s midterm contests that will determine control of the House and the Senate was swiftly condemned by top Democrats in Congress, who raised questions about the timing given longstanding Justice Department protocol to avoid overt investigative steps involving political candidates in the direct run-up to an election. Omar, an outspoken critic of President Donald Trump, said she was being targeted as one of the Republican’s “political enemies.”

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NYC Mayor Mamdani pledges to reform police use of force

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani ordered the police to conduct a review of their use-of-force policies, which were central to an oversight board’s decision to recommend excessive force charges against the officer, Salvatore Alongi, in the death of the 19-year-old Win Rozario in 2024, reported The New York Times. 

“When the government uses force against a New Yorker, the standard for accountability must be at its highest,” Mr. Mamdani said in a statement. “Every New Yorker deserves to know that force will be used lawfully, carefully and only when necessary.”

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It is a crime to send federal troops or armed federal law enforcement agents to any polling place

With the mid-term elections approaching, questions have arisen over whether the Trump administration might attempt to station federal troops at polling places. As the Brennan Center and many others have pointed out, this would be clearly illegal: Section 592 of Title 18 of the United States Code criminalizes deploying federal troops or armed federal law enforcement agents to any polling place, and multiple other federal criminal and civil laws bar military interference in an election, reported Just Security. Such laws buttress the Posse Comitatus Act, which generally prohibits federal military participation in civilian law enforcement except where Congress has expressly authorized it. 

These laws, most of which have been in force for more than 150 years, unmistakably convey Congress’s intent to bar any kind of military interference in American elections. Even so, in 1968, the Office of Legal Counsel asserted in a short, conclusory memo that Section 592’s prohibition on troops at the polls does not apply if the president has invoked the Insurrection Act. The Insurrection Act is the most important statutory exception to the Posse Comitatus Act, allowing the president to use federal military forces to execute the law in certain emergency situations. 

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Mangino joins Chris Stewart on Law and Crime's 'On the Case'

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Another proud moment for the USA, "War" Secretary Hegseth wants to bring back public executions

The last public execution in the U.S. was a hanging in Owensboro, KY in 1936.  20,000 people showed up. The U.S. was ridiculed internationally—and public executions stopped for 90 years.  I wrote in my book The Executioner's Toll, about the execution of Rainey Bethea, a black man, who was hanged for the rape of a white woman. Now the U.S. military wants to bring public executions back.

The New York Times reported that the Army officer convicted in the 2009 Fort Hood shooting would be executed in public, a practice that ended in the United States nearly a century ago and is most commonly carried out in a handful of countries, including Iran, North Korea and Afghanistan.

The Pentagon said in a statement that the military execution, scheduled for Dec. 3, would also be broadcast via livestream. Such a broadcast has little precedent, and releasing video of executions is most often associated with extremist militant groups like the Islamic State.

The announcement adds to the growing spectacle around the planned execution of Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, who killed 13 people and wounded 32 others when he brought a personal handgun onto the grounds of Fort Hood, Texas. The rampage was the deadliest shooting at an American military base and sent shock waves through the U.S. military.

There are few countries that hold public executions. The human rights group Amnesty International has highlighted some cases in which public executions in Iran and Saudi Arabia have been filmed by bystanders.

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