FedEx Indicted For Failing To Look Into Its Packages To See If Any Online Pharmacies Were Sending Drugs
from the say-what-now? dept
Back in March of last year, we were somewhat disturbed by UPS agreeing to forfeit $40 million to the US government for shipping drugs from “illegal internet pharmacies.” Not that such drugs or pharmacies should be legal (that’s a whole different discussion), but it’s insane to pin the blame for the shipments on the shipping company, whose sole job is to get packages from point A to point B. In fact, we don’t want shipping companies to be liable for what’s in packages, because then they have not just the incentive, but the mandate to snoop through all our packages.
Apparently, FedEx was unwilling to fall on its sword and cough up a similar amount to the US government, so the DEA and DOJ have announced they’ve gotten a grand jury to indict the company for delivering drugs associated with internet pharmacies. You can read the full indictment, which tries to spin a variety of stories into evidence that somehow FedEx “knew” what was in those packages. The indictment does describe FedEx deliveries to vacant homes and parking lots where carloads of people would be waiting.
As early as 2004, FEDEX couriers and customer service agents in Kentucky, Tennessee, and Virginia expressed safety concerns to their management, including the following: FEDEX trucks had been stopped on the road by Internet pharmacy customers demanding packages of pills; delivery addresses included parking lots, schools, and vacant homes where people would wait for deliveries of drugs; customers would jump on FEDEX trucks and demand Internet pharmacy packages; FEDEX drivers were threatened if they insisted on delivering a package to the address instead of giving the package to the customer who demanded it; and customers would use multiple names and identification documents to pick up packages of drugs.
A FEDEX employee also raised concerns to FEDEX management that some recipients of Internet pharmacy packages were engaged in “doctor shopping,” were “known to be selling and using,” and that “some of the recipients have overdosed and died.”
While that may sound damning, remember this is the DEA/DOJ’s spin on things. Even if everything above is true, FedEx’s job is to deliver packages, not examine everything inside those packages to make sure they’re legal. Even in some of the cases — as described in the indictment — where FedEx becomes aware that some of the companies ran into trouble with the DEA for selling drugs illegally, it’s hard to see how that means FedEx should automatically drop all business connections with those entities. Presumably, a firm that was caught selling drugs illegally could have other legitimate business to continue and would make use of services like FedEx going forward. It’s not FedEx’s job to examine everything in those packages.
This is, quite literally, blaming the messenger.
FedEx is fighting these claims pretty aggressively, insisting that it’s crazy to make it responsible for what’s in the packages:
“We are a transportation company ? we are not law enforcement.”
Furthermore, the company notes that it has long asked the DOJ to provide it with a list of online pharmacies that it shouldn’t do business with, so that it didn’t have to just guess. The government did not provide the list, and seems to think that FedEx must be psychic (and should know what’s in all packages and whether or not they’re illegal.”
“We have repeatedly requested that the government provide us a list of online pharmacies engaging in illegal activity,” [VP Patrick Fitzgerald] said. “Whenever DEA provides us a list of pharmacies engaging in illegal activity, we will turn off shipping for those companies immediately. So far the government has declined to provide such a list.”
Even a former DEA official interviewed by Bloomberg, Larry Cote, claimed the situation was extreme and unprecedented:
The criminal case is an unprecedented escalation of a federal crackdown on organizations and individuals to combat prescription drug abuse, said Larry Cote, an attorney and ex-associate chief counsel at the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.
?Targeting a company that?s two, three steps removed from the actual doctor-patient, pharmacy-patient relationship is unprecedented,? said Cote….
?The DEA does believe that everyone in the supply chain is responsible and has an obligation to understand where their products are ending up,? said Cote, calling that ?a stretch.?
We often talk about secondary liability on the internet, but it’s the same basic principal here. The company that’s merely acting as the conduit shouldn’t be liable for what’s traversing over its system. The implications of changing that, and holding a company liable are very serious. It’s going to create massive incentives for shipping companies to not just open up and look at what’s in our packages, but to also make on-the-fly determinations of whether or not they think it’s legal.
Filed Under: dea, doj, drugs, online pharmacies, secondary liability, shipping
Companies: fedex
Comments on “FedEx Indicted For Failing To Look Into Its Packages To See If Any Online Pharmacies Were Sending Drugs”
“Whenever DEA provides us a list of pharmacies engaging in illegal activity, we will turn off shipping for those companies immediately. So far the government has declined to provide such a list.”
The DEA is obviously still waiting for the US pharma companies to provide the list of ‘rogue’ pharmacies/competitors, whereas the US pharma companies are reluctant to provide that list, because if they do people will be able to see that the vast majority of it is almost certainly nothing more nefarious than people getting perfectly legal drugs, from out of country, because they can’t afford the US prices.
It sounds as if FedEx failed to chip in to this year’s election campaign brib- err, funding. Guess this is retribution from the feds?
Can fed ex sue the DEA for failure to stop the bad drug people first?
‘then they have not just the incentive, but the mandate to snoop through all our packages’
the whole idea of the DEA and the DoJ is exactly that, to be able to snoop through packages, removing another piece of privacy and freedom from the people!
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They want the ability to snoop through all of the snail mail we send and receive whenever they want? I’m fine with that so long as we can do the same to them.
They want to see detailed lists of all the links we click and websites we visit each year? I’m fine with that so long as we can do the same to them.
They want to view, at any time, the contents of all the e-mails we send and receive? I’m fine with that so long as we can do the same to them.
They want access to everyones phone and geolocation records, as well as audio recordings of all our conversations? I’m fine with that so long as we can do the same to them.
They want access to all of the texts, forum postings, comments, tweets, files, etc, that we send and receive daily? I’m fine with that so long as we can do the same to them.
They want laws which allow them to force everyone to give up all of their passwords upon demand? I’m fine with that so long as we can do the same to them.
They want to create laws which prevent us from even using any and all forms of encryption to begin with? I’m fine with that so long as we can do the same to them.
They want to subvert all of our Constitutional rights and justify doing so by claiming it makes our country safer? I’m fine with that so long as we can do the same to them.
They want to be able to come into our homes and search through everything found there, all without a warrant? I’m fine with that so long as we can do the same to them.
They want to put surveillance equipment everywhere and justify it by saying its all to prevent crime? I’m fine with that so long as we can do the same to them.
If any of this bothers them, how can they possibly expect it to not bother us? If any of this scares them, how can they possibly expect it to not scare us? What’s good for the goose is good for the gander. You can’t pick and choose when rules apply and when they don’t. They either apply to everyone or no one. There can be no middle ground on this point if we want to prove our basic human rights matter and we’re the truly democratic society we claim to be.
Boston Tea Party
This time the government shaking us down for excessive taxes and limiting our options on who we can and cannot purchase from is our own. The mail carriers that we entrust our packages to are the ones charged with inspecting them for contraband. Smuggled goods are now mainly perfectly legal things, purchased legally, but now somehow illegal due to overbearing red tape once they cross into our territory. The minor fact that the extra costs incurred by purchasing things in america all go to very large corporations. These corporations happen to have exclusive rights to distribute their product locally. The fact that most of those currently in power own part or all of these companies, has nothing to do with it I’m sure.
Re: Boston Tea Party
Excessive taxes?!? you do realize that taxes are the lowest they have ever been in the US, at any time since the Great Depression, don’t you?
Re: Re: Boston Tea Party
All taxes ? Corporate txes? Medical device taxes ? Health insurance taxes. ? Are you delusional or an ingester of illegal medications ?
Re: Re: Re: Boston Tea Party
Corporate taxes? Are you kidding? There are so many loopholes specifically crafted to cater to corporations that any babbling about “excessive corporate taxes” should label the ranter a complete kook.
The US tax code is written to pander to corporations that incidentally are more like the British East India company than anything else from the colonial era.
Re: Re: Boston Tea Party
Why do you stop at the Great Depression? Have you forgotten the time before the great income tax? Things weren’t always this way.
Re: Re: Re: Boston Tea Party
Why do you stop at the Great Depression? Have you forgotten the time before the great income tax? Things weren’t always this way.
Yeah, there was the Roaring Twenties, when income inequality was almost as severe as it is now. Or was there something else you had in mind?
Re: Re: Boston Tea Party
That’s a Myth! By the way during the Boston Tea party with people bitching about those taxes that were in the 2-3% range and was to high! These days we are taxed on pretty much everything. I’m waiting for the day when they Tax the Air you breath directly. Half the population pays ZERO in Federal Taxes.
This Depression we’re in now has lasted a lot longer then the so called Great Depression. We have far more people on Wel-Fair then ever before. Taxes are still way to high, especially for those paying them all!!! Paying taxes and then just getting all your money back when you do your taxes doesn’t make you a Tax Payer.
Re: Re: Re: Boston Tea Party
This Depression we’re in now has lasted a lot longer then the so called Great Depression.
“So called”? You’re saying it really might not have been that big of a deal?
Re: Re: Re: Boston Tea Party
“during the Boston Tea party with people bitching about those taxes that were in the 2-3% range and was to high”
– I thought they were mostly complaining about the lack of representation, is this incorrect?
“These days we are taxed on pretty much everything”
– Except ill gotten gains – too big to jail and all that crap. Oh, yeah – and capitol gains not so much.
“Half the population pays ZERO in Federal Taxes.”
– I think you are embellishing … but regardless, we all know that when corporations and the uber riche use legal deductions it is all good and great, but when those low life peons use legal deductions it is tax evasion plain and simple! To the gallows with them!
“This Depression we’re in now has lasted a lot longer then the so called Great Depression”
– So called? Care to expound upon that?
– I believe you need to discuss the duration of the present economic downturn with the party of NO.
“We have far more people on Wel-Fair then ever before”
– Many of which hold full time jobs that pay minimum wage. Isn’t it fun subsidizing corporate greed?
“Taxes are still way to high, especially for those paying them all”
– Are you claiming that the very rich who pay no income tax are paying too much? Oh … I see, you are saying that those in poverty are not paying enough. How would that work, exactly?
“Paying taxes and then just getting all your money back when you do your taxes doesn’t make you a Tax Payer.”
– Actually … it does. Overlooking the free interest rate loan these people give uncle Sam, the wage slaves are not the ones passing tax law – they simply follow what the law says and therefore they met their tax obligations – do you forgo deductions because you do not believe they should be allowed? If the rich get cudos for all their nifty dodges and evasions that garner high fives at cocktail parties then the middle class should not be belittled for filling out forms as the law stipulates. I think you are just a little brainwashed.
Re: Re: Re: Boston Tea Party
“Half the population pays ZERO in Federal Taxes.”
Since nobody else has corrected this and it’s a pet peeve of mine, I’ll bite. This is not true. What’s true is that half pays zero in income taxes (because they’re poor), but they pay all of the other federal taxes. Further, since those other taxes are not scaled according to income level, lots of those taxpayers pay a greater percentage of their income to the federal government than wealthier people do.
Why is it that the “horrors” that government agencies are always “protecting” us from are always dreadful sounding, but statistically insignificant, whereas the means they use to “protect” us are statistically predictable and frequent affronts to our most basic rights?
E.g. ogling, groping, harmless-property-disposing, and dignity-skull-fucking by the TSA…
E.g. victim-less-criminal-incarcerating, shipment-snooping, baby-flash-bang-bombing/burning, harmless-dog-shooting, and future-parolee-job-opportunity-screwing by the DEA and various law enforcement agencies…
E.g. privacy-violating, nude-picture-trading, email-reading, phone-call-recording by the NSA…
E.g. bankster-criminal-ignoring, harmless-“hacker”-persecuting, corporate-corruption-facilitating, lobbyist-door-revolving, and petty-copyright-enforcement-prioritizing by the DOJ…
…versus how many Americans have been killed in terrorist attacks? …versus how many terrorist plots that the FBI didn’t make up would have occurred otherwise? …versus how many people have overdosed on marijuana or shot up a school while they were high?
Isn’t monitoring overseas shipment something that Customs does?
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No, like with the TSA, their job is to annoy only and pretend they can intercept contraband. They’re incapable of actually doing it.
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Makes you wonder if they crawl all up in companies like Maersk the same way as they’ve done UPS and FedEx.
Well, we’ve learned one thing. The pharmaceutical industry has more clout with the feds than the shipping Industry. FedEx might want to consider giving some cushy jobs to outgoing Washington insiders. Among other things.
Wow that FEDEX Employee sure knows a lot about who he delivers to! I guess he went doctor shopping with them! And he must’ve gone around getting everybody’s private medical records to know who overdosed! And dang he must’ve gone on police ride alongs too to know they were selling drugs as well!!! That is one super dedicated FEDEX employee! Damn I’m not sure I’d put in all that effort before I talked to my manager!
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It’s not rocket science!
Every time secondary liability expands...
…a demon gets its wings.
Re: Every time secondary liability expands...
I thought it was a demon horde?
Wait, no, that’s when governments turn to tyranny.
For the record I’m going to guess that the drugs in question are likely prescription narcotics and stimulants. Oxycontin, Adderall, Ambein, Vicodin, etc. Stuff with street value, and/or addictive potential. This isn’t a case of people freaking out over lower priced blood pressure medicine.
The lack of a list of “illegal pharmacies” is unlikely to have anything to do with big US pharmacy companies being unwilling to come up with names. Rather it’s likely a function of it being a nightmare to determine who has been duped, who has been merely careless, and who has been knowningly, and actively breaking the law. Plenty of these online pharmacies are likely perfectly legal where they are based, and do plenty of legitimate business, which is why they can get the drugs in the first place. Determining who is deliberately failing in their legal obligations is difficult given the difference in jurisdictions.
In short, this has pretty much nothing to do with the prices of medications in the US. It’s about drug dealers, and drug addicts taking the things they do offline to fraudulently obtain prescription drugs, and taking them online. And the DEA is blaming the shippers for not either psychically knowing what shipments are problematic; or preemptively blacklisting legitimate businesses just in case. Behavior by the recipient is no guarantee they aren’t on the up and up. Just because they’re addicted to painkillers and/or an asshole about it doesn’t mean they don’t have a legitimate prescription to receive. Being addicted doesn’t even mean they don’t have a legitimate condition that’s being treated.
So yeah, the bottom line is that the story here isn’t about how much big pharmaceutical companies suck because medication prices in the US are high. The story here is the DEA and the DOJ whining that package carriers aren’t violating the fourth amendment on their behalf and making customs decisions on their own because the DEA’s job is hard.
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I don’t think it has anything to do with customs, it seems to be much more of a state to state, in country thing related to doctor shopping and the like. I am sure some of it is a border issue as well.
However, Fedex (and it’s drivers) should be a little wise when they are delivering to people who are not actually in the house they are going to, just standing nearby. Doubly so if the house is abandoned or half burned down. It should at least make them wonder a very little bit.
People who want to be met in parking lots and such should also send off alarm bells, and that is the sort of thing the DOJ seems most upset about. The cross the line from delivery company to accomplice when they willing forego their own rules to “help” this sort of transaction.
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So if i want a parcel delivered to my work and meet the delivery guy in the car park. What if i want to get a package that was sent incorrectly to my previous home which was burnt down or like many these days taken by the bank.
There are occasions for many suspicious looking things and the only way to deal with them is to look at why the situation is the way it is.
Namely why are people ordering from online pharmacies, is it because their life saving medication is so expensive in the US yet costs pennies from elsewhere, where an asthma inhaler costs $75 in the US but less than $5 from an internet supplier which supplies the exact same thing from the same manufacturer.
Why would i not want to take advantage of receiving my drugs from an on-line pharmacy and save my life and tens of thousands of dollars a year on medication that has been prescribed to me by a doctor.
And yes it is dangerous to order from online pharmacies that are not regulated, but in desperation i might just take the chance to save my life or the life of a family member if i had no other choice.
Maybe if this was acknowledged and something done about the Prices of Medication in the US this problem would drop to manageable levels.
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The shills around here don’t care about you. The only thing they care about is spreading propaganda and lies and ‘best scenario guesses’ wherever the government is lacking in transparency. They don’t seem to understand that governments have a duty to be transparent. I don’t want the best scenario guess of some shill to compensate for the lack of transparency I want actual transparency. The lack of transparency itself is corruption and if the government is going to be corrupt about not providing transparency then why should I believe that it’s not being corrupt about what it’s hiding.
Here is a relevant comment from another blog
bzipitidoo (4388) writes
(quote)
“One of Big Pharma’s leading talking points on why US citizens should not order prescription drugs from outside the US is the supposed danger that those drugs will be of substandard quality or outright fakes.”
(/quote)
http://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=2947&cid=70842
and, from my understanding, many of those same pharma companies buy their drugs or have them manufactured in other countries. IOW, the govt simply gives them a distribution monopoly. They get to produce their drugs in countries where labor and taxes are perhaps cheapest (to avoid having to pay Americans more for the same thing), which hurts jobs here in America and lowers our average pay, while at the same time they get to prevent us from buying directly from manufacturers overseas, which increases prices. They want to charge us to distribute drugs from other countries but they don’t want to pay us to produce those drugs and they don’t want to allow us to buy directly from those other countries at cheaper prices. They are simply a parasite middlemen leeching off of everyone else.
(/quote)
sjames writes
(quote)
The funny part is that other than the opiates, the questionnaires are probably just as effective as the cursory exam a doctor might give the patient before prescribing. Just a hell of a lot cheaper.
(/quote)
http://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=2947&cid=70823
and I think that’s the whole point of the govt requiring a prescription for everything. Because prescriptions cost money and so it keeps doctors and clinics employed.
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Again, this sort of thing would happen regardless of drug pricing. Online pharmacies will have the same advantage over brick and mortar stores that sites like Amazon and Newegg do, regardless of pricing.
And the behaviors alleged aren’t people desperate to get their asthma inhaler, it’s of people desperate to get their prescription narcotics. Those sort of people will always exist because they’re abusing the system for addiction or profit. Pricing won’t change that as the problem is that they can’t legitimately get prescriptions for the quantities they desire in the first place.
The only thing more reasonable medication prices would change is reducing the number of people impacted when the pharmacy they were buying from was shut down because their scruples ended at selling genuine medications at the price advertised.
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“The only thing more reasonable medication prices would change”
So then you agree that medication prices are unreasonable? and wouldn’t more reasonable prices fix that? Wouldn’t it allow consumers to not overpay for the medications they need? Wouldn’t that be a good thing?
Re: Re: Re: online pharmacy
Some pharmacies, perfectly legitimate ones, operate online because they run everything out of a warehouse in Nebraska or Oklahoma instead of incurring the higher costs of buying real estate and paying all those extra costs. Mailing 3 months of meds at a time is SOP for them.
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FedEx’s job is to deliver a package from point A to point B. Sketchy behavior on the part of their recipients is only their concern in so far as it relates to driver safety, and whether or not someone is intercepting a package before it reaches it’s intended recipient. As long as they aren’t getting complaints about undelivered packages, and their drivers aren’t being assaulted, it isn’t their problem if they’re delivering to a homeless guy squatting in an abandoned house.
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So you think that people who agree to “carry a package” for someone they don’t know from say Mexico to the US that turns out to be 20 pounds of heroin is okay because they purposely ignored the source and the destination?
There is a line there somewhere that gets crossed. The DOJ thinks fedex crossed a similar line, that’s all.
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When the government/DOJ refuses to give shipping companies a list of ‘bad actors’ so that they can refuse shipments from them, it’s not like they have any other option, unless they want to start opening every package sent ‘just in case’, like the DOJ is pushing for here.
Without a list, the choices are basically ‘check everything’, or ‘check nothing’, and given the first would basically slow their business to a crawl(among other problems with the idea), potentially killing it off, the second becomes the default choice.
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People do that all the time. They’re called shipping company employees and mail company employees. Quite often the packages get found out at places like customs. Yet you don’t see them indicting the mail man on a regular basis.
The bottom line is that it’s the whole job of the USPS, FedEx, and UPS to take packages from someone they don’t know, and deliver it to someone else they don’t know, regardless of how shady they appear to be. Just because someone looks like a drug dealer or drug addict it doesn’t mean they don’t have legitimate mail and packages to send and deliver.
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So you think that people who agree to “carry a package” for someone they don’t know from say Mexico to the US that turns out to be 20 pounds of heroin is okay because they purposely ignored the source and the destination?
“The source” being Mexico and “the destination” being the US? You’re saying that FedEx and the rest should refuse to ship packages from Mexico to the US because they might be drugs?
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No, I was asking what you would think if someone was stopped in that situation. Would they be guilty of anything? Would they be responsible? What if they worked for a private courier company? What if that company only delivered for this one person?
I am trying to see where you guys feel the line is on liability here. Fedex is a royal pain in the butt when it comes to shipping things at times, and equally a pain when it comes to receiving something. Their employees would certainly be bending the rules pretty far to deliver to people in parking lots and such without getting ID matching the original destination address, or for that matter delivering to people who do not appear to live in the abandoned property.
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No, I was asking what you would think if someone was stopped in that situation. Would they be guilty of anything? Would they be responsible?
Of course not.
What if that company only delivered for this one person?
Then it would be a completely different situation that has no relevance to FedEx.
Their employees would certainly be bending the rules pretty far to deliver to people in parking lots and such without getting ID matching the original destination address, or for that matter delivering to people who do not appear to live in the abandoned property.
I don’t recall an accusation that they’re delivering to a parking lot that’s unrelated to the delivery address. Lots of addresses have parking lots, and I don’t see what’s wrong with someone meeting the truck in the parking lot. Whether the shipment requires ID is a different matter. And I don’t think we want FedEx drivers determining whether a house looks abandoned.
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You keep trying to place responsibility in the hands of FedEx and blame them for circumstances and issues not within their control or legal jurisdiction. Why? Are you hoping the floodgates will open and pornographers can be allowed to shakedown ISPs for not letting them sue dead grandparents for not downloading their product?
You’re disgusting.
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You keep trying to place responsibility in the hands of FedEx and blame them for circumstances and issues not within their control or legal jurisdiction. Why?
I think it’s just because he’s a troll. Techdirt argues that FedEx shouldn’t be held responsible, therefore he has to argue that they should.
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If a package that turns out to be 20 pounds of heroin successfully crosses the border from Mexico to the US, I would want to know exactly what U.S. Customs and Border Protection are doing to earn their tax dollars.
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Well there is a mens rea requirement to be met. There are cases for instance where a guy goes to a fast food restaurant, orders something from the drive through and pays for it. However when they check the bag they see they got the wrong bag – it is loaded with drugs instead due to an employee dealing on the side and accidentally. Technically they are in possession of drugs but there is a total lack of mens rea.
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“For the record I’m going to guess”
I’m not interested in the guess of some shill. I want actual transparency. The citizens are entitled to a transparent government. A lack of transparency is a breach of the government’s obligation to provide what we are entitled to – what taxpayers pay taxes for – and so the lack of transparency itself is corruption.
“The lack of a list of “illegal pharmacies” is unlikely to have anything to do with big US pharmacy companies being unwilling to come up with names.”
This is nothing but worthless hearsay. Again, no one cares about your opinion about what you think is probable or not probable. I want actual transparency not mere guesswork.
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And this is part of why I comment anonymously on this site. If I used a consistent name I’d have people like you launching ad hominem attacks at me all the time, simply because I said something you disagreed with once.
Nice transparency rant. What exactly does it have to do with this situation? The problem here isn’t the government not being open about it’s actions, the problem is that they’re whining that FedEx didn’t fucking help them violate the Fourth Amendment.
Oh shut up. All any of us are working on at the moment is guesswork. The most we have to go on is a federal indictment, which aren’t famed for their completeness and objectivity. The “transparency” you’re demanding here would be the actual evidence to be produced at trial assuming things get that far.
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“What exactly does it have to do with this situation?”
as you said
“The lack of a list of “illegal pharmacies””
That list would be part of being transparent.
“which aren’t famed for their completeness and objectivity.”
and perhaps they should be more complete and objective.
“The “transparency” you’re demanding here would be the actual evidence to be produced at trial assuming things get that far.”
There is a good chance FedEx won’t even try to fight it, even if they can potentially win, just because the cost of a lawsuit is so expensive. The feds are probably seeking to settle. In which case the government should provide a whole lot more transparency. They should have to justify to the public why are they threatening FedEx with a long, drawn out, expensive trial if they don’t settle for having to pay huge sums of money to the DOJ. I want answers and more transparency. What I don’t want are your best scenario guesses.
“All any of us are working on at the moment is guesswork.”
Which is exactly the problem. I want government transparency to work with and not just guesswork.
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and we the taxpayers are entitled to government transparency. They owe us that because we pay taxes.
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“If I used a consistent name I’d have people like you launching ad hominem attacks at me all the time, simply because I said something you disagreed with once. “
If you’re so obviously a shill I’m going to call you out on it.
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“Oh shut up.”
Ok, after reading through your original comment more carefully maybe you’re right, I should shut up. It does appear you are not a shill. My apologies.
Having said that what I’m guessing might have happened, if the DOJ acted correctly (who knows), is the DOJ simply went online and ordered unauthorized drugs from an online pharmacy via FedEx. Upon being able to receive the ordered drugs they told FedEx this online company is delivering unauthorized drugs and to stop shipment from them and FedEx either failed to stop shipment at least one time in the future or the drug company somehow found a way around the block by getting the packaged delivered from another location. and to some extent rerouting the package is very difficult for FedEx to regulate.
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As a former employee of both UPS and FedEx, I have helped DEA and local athorities in catching drug dealers that were shipping illegal packages. Everytime we were made aware of illegal activities, we coorporated. I have delivered packages with a DEA agent in the seat next to me, an athorities rush in once we leave. This is stupid, we notified athorities when we suspect something is obviously wrong. We can’t be expected to know what is in all packages. And again, what about the US Mail, are they not guilty as well if FedEx and UPS are?
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You’re quite right. The story on how much big pharmaceutical companies suck because medication prices in the US are high deserves its own thread.
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While I respect that view I do think this does relate to high drug prices. Foreign pharmaceutical companies delivering pharmaceuticals over here act as competition and competition naturally drives the prices of prescriptions and pharmaceuticals down. Local businesses do not want that and the government has been known to fight for the profits of local business over consumer welfare.
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“Local businesses do not want that”
Some of these “local” companies have declared themselves foreign in order to avoid taxation then wag their finger at foreign products while being all self righteous about how US citizens are not paying enough in taxes. Oh, and then they get all huffy when put in the spotlight by media.
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“For the record I’m going to guess that the drugs in question are likely prescription narcotics and stimulants. “
You would be incorrect.
“So yeah, the bottom line is that the story here isn’t about how much big pharmaceutical companies suck because medication prices in the US are high.”
It kinda is. That’s exactly what it’s about.
More protectionism.
sounds like outright extortion at this point. Watching the past 3 presidential governments has been like watching organized crime slowly come out into the open. The worst part of it is that so few seem to care they are losing what made them so very different from a country like Russia or north korea.
It is ironic as well considering the US government has US troops guarding opium fields in Afghanistan for use in the US sanctioned drug trade.
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Next thing you know we’ll have Obamahair being passed.
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“The worst part of it is that so few seem to care”
… according to the corporate owned media.
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The past 3 ? It goes back much further.
This blog is the face of Google. Think about that.
Re: Re:
Can you provide proof of your assertion? Because so far no one has been able to do that.
Jury
What gets me is that a jury could actually have indicted them for this, seriously do they not make sure that people on a jury have intelligent higher than a 12 year old. Or maybe that is the point.
Re: Jury
What gets me is that a jury could actually have indicted them for this, seriously do they not make sure that people on a jury have intelligent higher than a 12 year old. Or maybe that is the point.
You should look up how grand juries work. As the famous line from Bonfire of the Vanities goes, a prosecutor can easily get a grand jury to “indict a ham sandwich.” Most people have no idea how grand juries really work, but if you want a good (if depressing) description, read this:
http://www.popehat.com/2014/02/27/the-kaley-forfeiture-decision-what-it-looks-like-when-the-feds-make-their-ham-sandwich/
The whole thing is worth reading, but here’s a snippet that reveals that the grand jury does very little. Basically, prosecutors give it drips and drabs of info over many months and then says “indict!” and the grand jury rubber stamps.
Re: Jury
Ever hear of jury selection?
Part of the ongoing move to privatization. Taking care of prisoners has already been privatized. Why not collecting the people to put into the prisons in the first place? There is an opportunity here for some serious vertical integration.
“…merely acting as the conduit…”
If this was the entirety of the salient facts you might have a point, but the factual allegations are far, far broader. Surely at some point even you would have to agree that a line is crossed and a company can reasonably be viewed as complicit in illegal transactions.
Re: Re:
Please point to the relevant US law that allows the package carrier the right to open and inspect the contents of packages they pick-up and deliver?
What’s that? Can’t find one? The function of checking the content of packages at the border belongs to customs?
Maybe they are just too busy groping people at the airports (soon to be features elsewhere) and cannot find the time to grope some packages (which is a whole lot less fun).
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Never mind the law, I just don’t see the moral responsibility for it. I see one against it, though. What is in the packages is none of their damn business.
Now, if you are dealing with a particular wackaloon “customer” on a particular delivery, it might be smart to ring up law enforcement. But then law enforcement needs to move very quickly and release the driver so everyone else can have their packages on time.
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if that was the case all those banks that were too big to fail would have had their executives arrested for knowingly laundering money for terrorist organizations instead of getting light fines. ( a 10 million fine is light if said company makes 20 billion a year)
Did they forget to indict the manufacturer of the vehicles used in this crime? Or how about everyone that contributed via taxation to the making of roads traversed? This could turn into a very large case if they used just a little imagination. Secondary, thiriary, fouriary … this looks like fun – lets roll.
So by that logic...
As a result of flushing drugs down the toilet, the municipal water utility is now criminally responsible for drug trafficking. Likewise, the US Postal Service probably let a few packages slip through, so that entire organization must be taken to court. We can continue this idiocy all day…
Re: So by that logic...
The municipal water and sewer utility has the responsibility to inspect the contents being flushed before said waste is allowed to proceed.
ahem
the votes we cast during our service as a juror is the final stop gap measure to prevent government abuse.
wouldn’t it be awesome to have your assets frozen by a grand jury of people just naturalized via amnesty by people that still cannot speak proper English, never-mind the fact that their knowledge of the law is worse than the average but commonly massively ignorant American?
Do you not yet understand why the dems want these people here? Not only do they vote to keep them in power, they also vote to put innocent people in jail or at the very least at odds with the government.
Re: ahem
Yeah, and the lizard people are taking over the government.
Re: ahem
Whose knowledge is it which is worse than the average massively ignorant American again?
Simple Response from FedEx...
…for how to deal with this fiasco.
“Hello, FedEx, may I help you? You want to ship a package? Certainly, that’s why we’re here! Where is it being picked up? DEA offices downtown? Oh, I’m very sorry. We can’t help you. FedEx does not do business with the U.S. Government. You’ve not received any shipments through FedEx lately? The same reason. FedEx will not cooperate with the government in any way whatsoever. I’m sorry, ma’am. There’s nothing we can do about it. The government is engaged in open and notorious criminal activity and under state law, we would would be aiding and abetting that activity. How can this be fixed? The government has to abide by the law and Constitution; it’s that simple. I don’t think that kind of language is appropriate to a conversation of this sort. You have a good day now, okay?
And the FedEx employee hangs up on the now-furious and embarrassed DEA agent.
Funny part is that Fedex sends “illegal” drugs along the “legal” ones, which just happened to be manufactured in same factory, on same production line. Independent distibution, and hence, THE price paid by end user makes them “illegal”.
Whom the feds try to protect here?
Shipping Documentation
When one ships by a truck the paper work includes a description of the shipment on the bill of lading. But when using a courier or package service the paperwork does not require a description of the shipment on the waybill only addresses for domestic shipments.
International shipments will have customs declarations that describe the goods and their value so the correct duty can be assigned.
So if the shipments are coming from Canada or Mexico the area to look at is the customs declarations. If they are incorrect then the shipper/receiver can be hit with try to evading paying the proper duties. If the shipment is domestic there is currently no method to determine what is the contents are.
Re: Shipping Documentation
And how would you suggest they find out what’s inside it in order to compare it with the manifest? (If you didn’t already know, I believe that it’s currently done at international borders via x-rays & sniffers.)
Re: Re: Shipping Documentation
How would Fed Ex find out, or how would Customs find out?
Customs routinely opens and inspects packages. They reseal the boxes with tape that alerts the receiver that the package has been inspected (It’s usually red). DHL and other couriers will also take that task on themselves, and they also use tape that alerts the receiver that the package has been opened and inspected.
As far as I know, the private couriers have every right to open and inspect packages at their whim. They often have to do this when a label falls off and the only way to possibly determine the final destination is to open the package and hope that paperwork inside points to the correct address. That’s why it’s a good idea to include a paper with the destination address inside of your package, in case the label gets lost or damaged.
I believe only domestic US Mail is protected from tampering.
Re: Re: Re: Shipping Documentation
Hell, besides all that, I’ve had packages seized, opened, and inspected by US Fish & Wildlife! I worked with antique instruments and some of those old instruments have ivory parts or are made out of exotic material like tortoise shell.
“FedEx Indicted For Failing To Look Into Its Packages To See If Any Online Pharmacies Were Sending Drugs” Maybe I’m missing something here but isn’t that what “Online Pharmacies” do? You know, send drugs to people? I imagine that an online pharmacy would have thought that sending drugs to people was pretty high up on the business plan list of things we must do. Much like Pizzahut board executives deciding that selling pizzas was the way forward.
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Unless the company name includes the phrase ‘Online Pharmacy’ and is emblazoned all over the packaging, then no, FedEx can’t know that an online pharmacy is sending the drugs. Please set up a new strawman to be shot down, it’s kinda fun!
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Sure, because no seller of illicit items would ever be smart enough to think of putting some completely innocuous label on the parcel, such as “ACME widgets”, rather than emblazoning it with their usual giant “JOE’S ILLEGAL DRUGS! 1-800-GANJA4U!”.
Get the DEA to ride shotgun
It sounds like we need some “Ground Marshals” to ride shotguns in these trucks where customers jump in demanding the packages. You can’t deliver a 20-gauge ammo to the abdomen, but you can deliver 20-gauge steel to the wrists.
Huh, maybe they’ll start singing once they get arrested.
Re: Get the DEA to ride shotgun
But if they step out of the truck and see their shadow, they go back inside for another 6 stops.
Big pharma orders the DOJ around now? I know the MAFIAA orders DHS around and sends them to movie theaters to bust glassholes. But now government agencies are taking orders directly from big pharma too?
It’s extremely depressing that America has come to the point where federal agencies are taking orders directly from wealthy plutocrats.
Re: Re:
Oh they’ve been doing that for a long time, it’s just they’re more transparent about it these days.
RENEGADE LAW ENFORCEMENT ON A MISGUIDED AND ILL FATED CRUSADE.
RENEGADE LAW ENFORCEMENT ON A MISGUIDED AND ILL FATED CRUSADE.
Who are these people that set themselves up like some Micro God demanding absolute blind obedience and offering total subjugation, deciding what is good for everyone. I object. The D.E.A.are a group of evil authoritarian sociopaths., Completely out of control and way over the top. Billions in public grant funds are being misdirected and commandeered by these Authoritarian Sociopaths. This is funds intended for the well being and benefit of the American people. Instead turned on the American people and used to buy entire weapons systems used for war,now targeting mostly pot smokers and the homeless and other victims. This theft of public funds must stop. The grant funding empowering them to make their war on the American people are funds taken from us all. The world had enough of these soulless creatures when the S.S. goosestepped onto the world stage during World War Two.
Wouldn’t FedEx poking around with a delivery of medicine prescribed by a physician be an obvious violation of HPAA?
Please use 'principle' and 'principal' correctly
Principle
Re: Please use 'principle' and 'principal' correctly
Your never going too get you’re weigh on this.
Their are just two many people out they’re using there words wrong too get to upset and loose you’re cool about it.
Mini common examples exist of incorrect usage.
People pick the write words two use according too there porpoises.
But you’d have to be a fool to begin or end a sentence with the word “but”.
And only an idiot would begin or end a sentence with “and”.
Re: Re: Please use 'principle' and 'principal' correctly
And only an idiot would begin or end a sentence with “and”.
Whoa, careful! You’re coming off as an idiot under your own definition.
Re: Re: Re: Please use 'principle' and 'principal' correctly
Whoa, careful! You’re coming off as an idiot under your own definition.
Thank you for explaining the joke, that always makes it more funny.
As late comedian Mitch Hedberg once joked...
“I love my FedEx guy ‘cause he’s a drug-dealer and he doesn’t even know it.”
That’s the important point, isn’t it? FedEx doesn’t know what’s in the parcels it delivers, its job is merely to deliver them.
Inspection of containers
I agree with the overall tenor of the article, but this case is not merely about inspecting packages but rather about the knowledge of criminality the delivery company must infer from intrinsic evidence.
If it was all about FedEx delivering closed containers from A to B and there was no way to distinguish between child pornography and cat pictures, and the government attempted to hold the company strictly liable for the contents, the similarity to secondary liability on the internet would be appropriate.
But here, there is apparently information intrinsic to the contents the government argues FedEx has been ignoring.
Re: Inspection of containers
Except FedEx is not a person. Despite the best attempts of certain people to equate a corporation with a person, it’s just not so. A corporation is a machine. At best it’s a rampaging mob. It is not some perfect Borg style hive mind. The fact that you can go fishing for incriminating information doesn’t mean that the machine is really “aware” of something.
People need to stop pretending that corporations are people.
This is one area where that metaphor obviously breaks down as complaints can easily get bogged down in a beaurocracy.
This is much like expecting an email service or a web locker to dedicate the majority of it’s resources to “detecting illegal activity”. They have better things to do with their time and resources.
Not enough opportunity for graft
My guess is that Fedex hasn’t given enough in demoncrat political donations.
Re: Not enough opportunity for graft
Yeah, because corruption is always the other guys – never the “good guys”.
Re: Re: Not enough opportunity for graft
A Democrat is currently in the White House. That means that a democrat is in charge of all parts of the executive branch. That includes the DOJ,DEA,ATF & Customs.
If you’re going to bribe someone, it’s going to be a Democrat.
Re: Re: Re: Not enough opportunity for graft
Yup, like I said, corruption only happens on the other side of the aisle.
Melinda Haag USAttorney J Douglas Wilson Chief, Investigative Division.
Hopefully the comments are searched. Tech Dirt shouldn’t make readers have to do this
Operation Choke Point?
Is this more of that Operation Choke Point garbage; where the government is attacking honest businesses trying to get them to do the job they are incapable of doing themselves? I’ll bet this has to do with FedEx delivering packages to and from the states of Colorado and Washington.
Since when should buying my own medicine be a crime?
One of the roots of such wasteful, foolish, thuggish, and tyrannous government is the ease with which it can create almost unlimited amounts of money out of thin air. Near-infinite money buys near-infinite government, and a bureaucracy that is generously funded can entertain an open-ended dream about how to expand its realm.
Every day more people are coming to the judgment that a carefully organized effort to repair the constitution via the States’ power to propose and ratify amendments has less risk to our liberty and prosperity than the present trajectory of the federal government and especially the federal bureaucracy.
The first order of business of an Article V Convention must be to limit government’s ability to create and spend near-infinite amounts of money.
Uncle Nazi is getting pretty uppity.
Makes perfect sense
UPS / FedEx should be responsible for what is in packages they deliver from point A to point B, in the same way that ISPs should be responsible for the content of the bits in packets they route from point A to point B.
Re: Makes perfect sense
Oh, and phone companies should be responsible for the contents of phone conversations — because terrorism!
UPS / FedEx responsible — because drugs!
ISP’s responsible — because copyright!
Not the only ones...
How about indicting the US Postal Service as well?
Betcha they do a lot of this stuff too-but they’re not caught at it.
Because they have the right to look at the packages too if they think they’re suspicious.
And Fed-Ex should fight this to the nail. Blackmail has its’ limits.
How about also indicting the customers for receiving illegal drugs? Wouldn’t that make more sense (but not more money, I guess)
Re: Not the only ones...
How about also indicting the customers for receiving illegal drugs? Wouldn’t that make more sense (but not more money, I guess)
That would be a lot of work. There are thousands or millions of recipients that would have to be tracked down, but only one FedEx.
More DOJ Shakedown
This is just a continuation of the DOJ’s shakedown of businesses to shun undesirable, but legal, businesses. Just as they’ve scared major banks from providing account services for pornographers and firearm dealers, this is an attempt to scare FedEx from taking shipments from any on-line pharmacy for fear of being liable for handing a poison package of illegal product.
You gotta love the spin
You gotta love the spin involved in this case. Let’s reword their paragraph and see if it sounds just as scary.
As early as 2004, FEDEX couriers and customer service agents in Kentucky, Tennessee, and Virginia expressed safety concerns to their management, including the following: FEDEX trucks had been stopped on the road by Amazon customers demanding packages of books; delivery addresses included parking lots, schools, and vacant homes where people would wait for deliveries of books; customers would jump on FEDEX trucks and demand Amazon packages; FEDEX drivers were threatened if they insisted on delivering a package to the address instead of giving the package to the customer who demanded it; and customers would use multiple names and identification documents to pick up packages of books.
I think it sounds absurd either way, but I’m not a DOJ employee looking to make a name for himself. At least they didn’t try to add “using a computer to place a delivery order” and call it a cybercrime.
The DEA is no longer content with going after citizens in their un-winnable but highly lucrative fight for a drug free world – they are now looking at major US corporations. Is there anyone in America apart from drug warrior zealots who honestly believe FED-EX would jeopardize their entire world wide operations for a few dollars earned smuggling drugs?
Quit FedEx
FedEx has become a big pain in the axx requiring all inds of paperwork and failing to explain what I need and they deliver the shipments now in 2-3 weeks! And they think that is normal! I quit FedEx and I quit all of the “speed couriers”.