Kohlmeier v. State

After a supermarket reported two customers buying an unusually large number of matches, police issued a lookout for a matching truck and later stopped Nicholas Kohlmeier (defendant), who was driving it with two passengers matching the supermarket customers' descriptions, for a nonworking tag light. A search revealed cold medicine containing pseudoephedrine, fuel treatment containing methanol, a camping stove, and kerosene, and officers separately found a bag of matchbooks along the road between the gas station and the stop; an expert explained pseudoephedrine, methanol, and matchbook red phosphorus are key methamphetamine-production ingredients. After his arrest, a recording captured Kohlmeier telling a passenger the supermarket had probably tipped off police about the matches. In exchange for a plea, the female passenger later told authorities the group had made methamphetamine before and planned to do so again that day, and that Kohlmeier had bought the fuel treatment for that purpose. Kohlmeier was convicted of criminal attempt to manufacture methamphetamine and appealed, arguing insufficient evidence.