2009 Connecticut Code
Title 21a Consumer Protection
Chapter 420b Dependency-producing Drugs
Sec. 21a-278a. Penalty for illegal manufacture, distribution, sale, prescription or administration.

      Sec. 21a-278a. Penalty for illegal manufacture, distribution, sale, prescription or administration. (a) Any person eighteen years of age or older who violates section 21a-277 or 21a-278, and who is not, at the time of such action, a drug-dependent person, by distributing, selling, prescribing, dispensing, offering, giving or administering any controlled substance to another person who is under eighteen years of age and is at least two years younger than such person who is in violation of section 21a-277 or 21a-278, shall be imprisoned for a term of two years, which shall not be suspended and shall be in addition and consecutive to any term of imprisonment imposed for violation of section 21a-277 or 21a-278.

      (b) Any person who violates section 21a-277 or 21a-278 by manufacturing, distributing, selling, prescribing, dispensing, compounding, transporting with the intent to sell or dispense, possessing with the intent to sell or dispense, offering, giving or administering to another person any controlled substance in or on, or within one thousand five hundred feet of, the real property comprising a public or private elementary or secondary school, a public housing project or a licensed child day care center, as defined in section 19a-77, that is identified as a child day care center by a sign posted in a conspicuous place shall be imprisoned for a term of three years, which shall not be suspended and shall be in addition and consecutive to any term of imprisonment imposed for violation of section 21a-277 or 21a-278. To constitute a violation of this subsection, an act of transporting or possessing a controlled substance shall be with intent to sell or dispense in or on, or within one thousand five hundred feet of, the real property comprising a public or private elementary or secondary school, a public housing project or a licensed child day care center, as defined in section 19a-77, that is identified as a child day care center by a sign posted in a conspicuous place. For the purposes of this subsection, "public housing project" means dwelling accommodations operated as a state or federally subsidized multifamily housing project by a housing authority, nonprofit corporation or municipal developer, as defined in section 8-39, pursuant to chapter 128 or by the Connecticut Housing Authority pursuant to chapter 129.

      (c) Any person who employs, hires, uses, persuades, induces, entices or coerces a person under eighteen years of age to violate section 21a-277 or 21a-278 shall be imprisoned for a term of three years, which shall not be suspended and shall be in addition and consecutive to any term of imprisonment imposed for violation of section 21a-277 or 21a-278.

      (P.A. 87-373, S. 3; P.A. 89-256, S. 1; P.A. 92-82; P.A. 94-233, S. 1.)

      History: P.A. 89-256 amended Subsec. (b) to increase the additional, nonsuspendable term of imprisonment from 2 to 3 years for the illegal sale of controlled substances near school grounds and amended Subsec. (c) to increase the additional, nonsuspendable term of imprisonment from 2 to 3 years for using a minor to commit drug offenses; P.A. 92-82 amended Subsec. (b) to increase the proximity distance to school property from 1,000 to 1,500 feet, to make the enhanced penalty applicable to transactions in or near a public housing project and to define "public housing project"; P.A. 94-233 amended Subsec. (b) to remove the exception for drug-dependent persons and make the enhanced penalty applicable to transactions in or near a licensed child day care center that is identified as a child day care center by a sign posted in a conspicuous place.

      See Sec. 21a-283a re authority of court to depart from prescribed mandatory minimum sentence.

      Cited. 32 CA 724. Cited. 35 CA 609. Evidence that was sufficient to prove violation of Sec. 21a-278 was, in this case, sufficient to prove violation of this section. 85 CA 575.

      Subsec. (a):

      Cited. 20 CA 694.

      Subsec. (b):

      Cited. 231 C. 941. Cited. 235 C. 477. Cited. 239 C. 427. Cited. 241 C. 650.

      Cited. 38 CA 621. Cited. 42 CA 500; Id., 537; judgment reversed, see 241 C. 650; Id., 640. Cited. 43 CA 339. Is a separate substantive offense from Sec. 21a-278(b). 58 CA 592. Legislature intended possession with intent to sell within 1500 feet of school and sale within 1500 feet of school to be separate crimes. 66 CA 118. Evidence presented, i.e. testimony of expert witness that distance between school and boundary line of property on which the sale of narcotics took place was 1430 feet and a photograph of the property with the point of sale indicated, was sufficient to support jury's finding that sale of narcotics was within 1500 feet of property on which a public elementary school was located. 67 CA 643. Does not require use of certain language to meet requirement of being "identified as a child day care center by a sign posted in a conspicuous place"; whether a posted sign satisfies statute is a question of fact. 70 CA 255. Conviction for conspiracy to sell a controlled substance to within 1500 feet of a public housing project reversed where trial court instructed that jury must find that conspiracy occurred within 1500 feet of public housing project. The law is not concerned with where the plan was hatched, but with where the conspirators proposed to carry out its unlawful purpose. 73 CA 386. Trial court properly determined that defendant possessed narcotics with intent to sell within 1500 feet of a school where defendant, upon being confronted by police, transferred drugs to a passenger in a motor vehicle. Defendant's actual transfer of drugs to the passenger was in and of itself evidence of intent to sell. 101 CA 167. Dissenting opinion: Intent to sell, without evidence of intent to sell at a location within a school zone, is not sufficient to find defendant guilty under statute. Handing a package of narcotics to a motor vehicle passenger with instructions that she "hold it" was not a sufficient act from which jury could infer that defendant intended to sell or dispense at that moment. Id.

      Subsec. (c):

      Cited. 25 CA 21. Cited. 32 CA 831.