XPost: ba.politics, dc.media, soc.penpals   
   XPost: alt.burningman   
   From: the.big.zero@barackobama.com   
      
   Washington (CNN) -- The Supreme Court ruled for a Pennsylvania   
   woman accused of violating laws tied to a chemical-weapons   
   treaty when she attacked the other woman in a love triangle.   
      
   The justices by a unanimous vote on Monday concluded the   
   government overstepped its authority when prosecuting Carol Anne   
   Bond, as part of the country's obligations enforcing a chemical   
   weapons agreement. At issue was whether Congress may criminalize   
   conduct -- under its treaty ratification power -- that is   
   otherwise the domain of the states.   
      
   Bond was given a long prison sentence in the federal system   
   after being convicted of using potentially lethal chemicals   
   against a romantic rival. She would have likely gotten a much   
   shorter sentence under state law.   
      
   The decision sends the case back to lower courts, which could   
   vacate the conviction.   
      
   The case of toxic love has soap-opera elements, but Bond's   
   lawyers argued she was being treated like a foreign terrorist   
   instead of someone caught up in an act of personal revenge   
   against a friend.   
      
   "The global need to prevent chemical warfare does not require   
   the federal government to reach into the kitchen cupboard,"   
   Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in his narrowly framed opinion,   
   "or to treat a local assault with a chemical irritant as the   
   deployment of a chemical weapon."   
      
   Beyond this fact-specific dispute, the case touched on larger   
   concerns about the strength and purpose of the Constitution's   
   10th Amendment, designed to preserve state power.   
      
   It is also a question roiling the current political debate,   
   especially among tea party conservatives in this post-9/11,   
   security-conscious environment.   
      
   The court majority largely avoided those questions in its   
   ruling. Roberts said the facts of the case limited their scope.   
   "This exceptional convergence of factors gives us serious reason   
   to doubt the government's expansive reading of the [law], and   
   calls for us to interpret the statute more narrowly."   
      
   Bond, a native of Barbados, lived outside Philadelphia and   
   worked as a microbiologist. As a federal appeals court   
   succinctly summarized the relevant facts in the case: "Bond was   
   excited when her closest friend, Myrlinda Haynes, announced she   
   was pregnant. Bond's excitement turned to rage when she learned   
   that her husband, Clifford Bond, was the child's father. She   
   vowed revenge."   
      
   The woman, known to her family as Betty, struck back by stealing   
   dangerous a chemical -- arsenic-based 10-chloro-10H-phenoxarsine   
   -- from her company. She also obtained potassium dichromate over   
   the Internet. Both substances in heavy doses can cause toxic,   
   even lethal harm with very little physical contact.   
      
   The 42-year-old then tried to poison Haynes some two dozen times   
   over several months, secretly sprinkling small amounts of the   
   chemicals on an apartment doorknob, car door handles, and a   
   mailbox.   
      
   While suffering no more than a chemical burn on her thumb,   
   Haynes grew suspicious -- one of the chemicals was a bright   
   orange powder. After getting little help from local police, in   
   2007 she called postal inspectors, who set up surveillance   
   cameras.   
      
   Bond was videotaped stealing mail and placing chemicals inside   
   the mailbox and a car muffler, court records show. She was soon   
   arrested.   
      
   Bond admitted her guilt early on and claimed she never meant to   
   kill Haynes, but only wanted to cause her "an uncomfortable   
   rash."   
      
   The defendant also said her friend's betrayal caused an   
   "emotional breakdown" that made her respond in such a shocking   
   fashion.   
      
   Instead of being charged with simple assault, which may have   
   gotten her six months to a year or two in state prison, Bond was   
   indicted in federal court on two counts of mail fraud and -- the   
   bombshell -- two counts of violating a federal law and   
   international treaty on the possession and use of "chemical   
   weapons."   
      
   When a judge denied her motions to transfer the case to state   
   court, Bond pleaded guilty and immediately appealed. She   
   received a sentence of six years behind bars and nearly $12,000   
   in fines and restitution. She was released in August 2012.   
      
   There are about 1,000 treaties signed by the United States   
   currently on the books.   
      
   Many academics and lawmakers had hoped the majority right-   
   leaning bench will use this opportunity to delve further into   
   the scope of the 10th Amendment, which states, "The powers not   
   delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor   
   prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states   
   respectively, or to the people."   
      
   In the broader political context, a bipartisan sphere of   
   Americans worry the federal government and Congress have been   
   overly aggressive in staking claims to disputes they believe are   
   best left to states, especially in the criminal arena.   
      
   And it is not just felonies. Areas like gun ownership, zoning   
   laws, environmental regulations, taxation, health care, and   
   education standards all could be re-examined in the wake of this   
   high court decision.   
      
   While agreeing the prosecution of Bond was improper, three other   
   members of the court-- Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas,   
   and Samuel Alito -- would have gone farther and said the court   
   should decide whether the law was a proper exercise of federal   
   power.   
      
   "We have here a supposedly 'narrow' opinion which, in order to   
   be 'narrow,' sets forth interpretive principles never before   
   imagined that will bedevil our jurisprudence (and proliferate   
   litigation) for years to come. The immediate product of these   
   interpretive novelties is a statute that should be the envy of   
   every lawmaker bent on trapping the unwary with vague and   
   uncertain criminal prohibitions," said Scalia.   
      
   He added that the majority "enables the fundamental   
   constitutional principle of limited federal powers to be set   
   aside by the President and Senate's exercise of the treaty   
   power. We should not have shirked our duty and distorted the law   
   to preserve that assertion; we should have welcomed and eagerly   
   grasped the opportunity-- nay, the obligation-- to consider and   
   repudiate it."   
      
   Some of Bond's supporters argue that some federal prosecutions   
   are novel and the penalties are often more harsh, creating   
   conflict and confusion with local efforts to ensure public   
   safety. They see Bond as an unexpected hero in the fight to   
   return "the power back to the people."   
      
   "The proposition that the Treaty Clause is a trump card that   
   defeats all of the remaining structural limitations on the   
   federal government is not a proposition that is logically   
   defensible," Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, said when the case was   
   argued in December.   
      
   Bond had won an earlier Supreme Court appeal, with a unanimous   
   ruling she had "standing," or legal authority, to pursue her   
   claims in the courts. That allowed her to continue trying to   
   have her federal conviction tossed out, which was the current   
   issue before the justices.   
      
   Her lawyers say she had been trying in recent years to repair   
      
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