United States v. De La Torre

Police raiding a hotel room saw Julio De La Torre (defendant) flee with a backpack he later discarded; a search of the backpack turned up distribution quantities of both marijuana and methamphetamine. De La Torre testified another occupant gave him the backpack and that, because the room's occupants had only used marijuana, he believed it held only marijuana, though he admitted realizing after the search that it also held methamphetamine. The judge instructed the jury it could convict on the methamphetamine count even if De La Torre did not know that drug was in the bag, and the jury convicted him on both drug counts; he appealed the methamphetamine conviction.