Justices with Texas' highest court on criminal matters upheld the 90-year prison sentence of a Lubbock businessman convicted more than three years ago of selling so-called synthetic marijuana out of his smoke shops.
In a 12-page opinion issued last week, justices found that testimony from an expert witness was sufficient to help jurors determine that a chemical structure found in synthetic marijuana seized from 54-year-old Anthony Carter's home and businesses were illegal under a 2015 revision of the state's drug statute prohibiting penalty group 2A, which used chemicals to mimic the effects of marijuana.
The opinion affirms Carter's Nov. 17, 2017, verdict and punishment, which included a $100,000 fine, from a jury trial in the 137th District Court.