Attorney Dean Alan Stowers's Legal Cases

Criminal defense

Federal Defense of Ephedrine Pill Company

N/A

OUTCOME: Not Guilty

This remarkable case was tried in Federal Court in Des Moines, Iowa for a period of 7 weeks. Dean Stowers and attorney Raymond Rosenberg defended the principal target in connection with the sale of lar ... ge amounts of ephedrine through a wholly lawful business to persons using the ephedrine to manufacture methamphetamine. Prior to trial, the government had seized several million dollars and was attempting to forfeit this money and virtually everything the defendants owned under the federal forfeiture laws. The government believed that defendants knew or should have known that the customers were making methamphetamine with their products. The defendants took the position that their conduct fell within what was known as the "ephedrine loophole" whereby the sale of the ephedrine pills in their FDA-approved form was exempted from various regulatory and statutory provisions, meaning that there were no restrictions on their sales of ephedrine. The defense focused upon the efforts the defendants had made to self-regulate, the efforts the methamphetamine manufacturers had undertaken to conceal their intended use of the ephedrine, and the fact that the government's investigation started with the Drug Enforcement Administration ascertaining the assets owned by the defendants, thus showing the motive of the investigation. The defendants faced essentially a life term if convicted, however, after the extended and lengthy trial, the jury found all defendants not guilty of all 17 counts after less than a day of deliberations. This case has been regarded as the most complex and lengthy federal trial in Iowa history.

Criminal defense

Waitress/Dancer with Roommate

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OUTCOME: Not Guilty

This was another Federal methamphetamine case involving large quantities being shipped via UPS from California to various addresses in Des Moines, Iowa. The client was a female who waitressed and dance ... d at a local establishment and took-in as her roommate a man deeply involved in the drug trade. This man was organizing drug shipments to addresses of relatives, friends, and complete strangers. It was claimed that Dean's client was participating in this activity and was guilty of conspiracy. However, Dean was able to successfully cross examine the key witnesses after a substantial amount of investigative work that uncovered the UPS delivery records and manner of delivery for every one of the drug shipments. In many instances the recipient signatures were forged by the client's roommate who intercepted the UPS driver at the address, or the packages were sent with no signature required and he would simply retrieve them. This led to testimony of the persons at the addresses to which the packages were delivered to the effect they had no idea they were being used by the roommate and were thankful they did not get wrongfully charged themselves. Dean's client was found not guilty.

Criminal defense

LSD, Tie Dye T-Shirts, Symbols on Paper and Cancer

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OUTCOME: Not Guilty

In the early 1990s there were numerous LSD prosecutions of persons for LSD offenses in Federal Court in Des Moines and Cedar Rapids, Iowa, several of which Dean defended. LSD is typically distributed o ... n perforated paper with symbols printed on the paper. In Des Moines, Dean successfully defended one defendant in a five defendant trial where the issue was whether particular packages contained LSD or tie-dye t-shirts sent from San Francisco. This case boasted some of the all-time most memorable witnesses, including one who fondled the blotter acid exhibit while testifying until he appeared to have ingested some of the LSD through his skin. Needless to say, he proved not very reliable. In this case Dean's client was able to employ the defense that the witnesses were not credible, there was no LSD in the key package, and the fallback position--that if LSD was in the package, the client's roommate must have taken it out of the package. In another LSD case Dean's client was a Loras college student from Chicago indicted for conspiring to distribute LSD on campus. This case turned on a lot of detailed preparation in Cedar Rapids made possible by the Des Moines flood of 1993. All discovery was dictated, transcribed and carefully organized and analyzed. The evidence showed that the witnesses all related events by reference to the symbols on the LSD blotter paper. During trial, it became apparent that the key witness was claiming Dean's client had a large amount of LSD on paper with a symbol that nobody else described until a markedly later time period; thus suggesting the witness, who was trying to earn a sentence reduction from the government, was fabricating the event. To defeat the claim that Dean's client had fled due to the investigation, and to show what he had been doing since attending college in Iowa, Dean offered evidence that his client had been battling Hodgkin's disease for many months and had his client reveal for the jury a surgical scar down the center line of his body. The client's mother also gave emotional testimony about what her son was doing since attending Loras college. The defense was that although the client used and purchased LSD, he never joined a conspiracy to distribute LSD. This client was found not guilty of the felony charge after a five day trial.

Criminal defense

The Catfishing Dishwasher Defense

N/A

OUTCOME: Not Guilty

Dean represented this Hispanic client on some substantial federal drug charges in Des Moines relating to marijuana and methamphetamine. He was the father of several codefendants who were on trial with ... him, some of whom resided with their father and mother in their home. The client was a simple, friendly-appearing man of very small stature who worked as a dishwasher at the Embassy Suites Hotel directly across the street from the federal courthouse and also situated on the Des Moines River. Pictures tell a thousand words. In trying to get to know the client, Dean met with his wife who worked as a maid at the same hotel and asked her to bring some pictures of her husband and family. Within the pictures were several photos of the client proudly displaying trophy catfish with notations of their length and weight and the date of catch. Dean also interviewed the client's supervisor, the Executive Chef for the hotel who thought the world of the client's work ethic and was familiar with his love of fishing. The Chef literally appeared in his work uniform with Chef hat on to testify. The defense was that a father does not work long hours for minimum wage as a dishwasher, nor would he spend countless hours fishing for trophy catfish to feed his family, if he was involved with his children in the type of major drug trafficking claimed by the government. He was found not guilty after a four day trial.

Dean Alan Stowers's Legal Cases (4)

Federal Defense of Ephedrine Pill Company

Waitress/Dancer with Roommate

LSD, Tie Dye T-Shirts, Symbols on Paper and Cancer

The Catfishing Dishwasher Defense