New Jersey Section 2C:35-25 – Sale restrictions for ephedrine products; disorderly persons offense.

New Jersey Has Strict Laws on Selling Ephedrine Products

New Jersey has enacted strict legal restrictions around the sale of ephedrine products under Section 2C:35-25 of the New Jersey Code of Criminal Justice. This law makes it a disorderly persons offense to sell certain ephedrine products in violation of the law’s restrictions.

What Does the Law Restrict?

Specifically, 2C:35-25 restricts the sale of any compound, mixture, or preparation containing any detectable quantity of ephedrine, pseudoephedrine, norpseudoephedrine, or phenylpropanolamine. This includes over-the-counter cold and allergy medications that contain these substances.

The law also restricts the sale of these products in combination with other compounds like caffeine, theobromine, or theophylline. So common combination cold medicines would fall under the restrictions.

Quantity Restrictions

The law places limits on the quantity of these medicines that can be sold. Specifically:

• No more than 3 packages (any size) can be sold to the same person within a 24 hour period.
• No single retail sale can exceed more than 3 grams of ephedrine base, pseudoephedrine base, norpseudoephedrine base, or phenylpropanolamine base in total weight.

These restrictions apply to both individual consumers purchasing for personal use, as well as retail distributors buying wholesale.

Required Record Keeping

The law also imposes record keeping requirements around these medicine sales. Any retailer selling these products has to maintain a written or electronic log recording:

• The date & time of sale
• The name and address of purchaser
• The name and quantity of product purchased

These records must be kept for at least two years and be available for inspection upon request by law enforcement or regulatory agencies.

Exemptions

There are some exemptions to the law, including:

• Sales pursuant to a valid prescription
• Sales to pharmacies, hospitals, physicians offices, veterinarians, or medical care facilities
• Wholesale sales where both parties are registered with the DEA
• Products labeled pursuant to federal regulation as exempt from quantity restrictions

So regular pharmacies and healthcare providers can still obtain and dispense these medicines without issue. The restrictions target consumer retail sales.

Penalties

A violation of 2C:35-25 is a disorderly persons offense. This can be punishable by:

• Up to 6 months in jail
• Up to a $1,000 fine
• Probation up to 2 years

So retailers need to take care to train staff on these restrictions and setup procedures to comply with the record keeping rules. Violations could lead to criminal charges, not just civil penalties.

The Policy Rationale

The policy rationale behind 2C:35-25 is to combat the use of ephedrine and similar chemicals in the illegal manufacture of methamphetamine. These common medicines are used as precursor ingredients to synthesize the illegal stimulant drug.

So by placing sales limits and imposing record keeping rules, the idea is to make it harder for meth cooks to accumulate large quantities of these precursor chemicals. This disrupts production and hopefully limits availability of meth on the street.

Critics of the policy argue that these restrictions also negatively impact legitimate consumers. It makes buying useful cold medicines more difficult and intrusive for regular folks just trying to treat their symptoms.

There’s also little evidence showing these policies significantly reduce meth availability long-term. Meth cooks adapt to restrictions by smurfing (using many different buyers) or switching recipes.

Has the Law Been Effective?

Research on the effectiveness of laws like 2C:35-25 has been mixed.

One 2021 study found that meth lab seizures temporarily declined after states adopted sales restrictions for ephedrine products. But the restrictions didn’t lower meth use rates long term and meth availability seemed to rebound as production shifted to Mexico.

However, a 2022 study found that state laws limiting pseudoephedrine sales did reduce meth lab incidents as well as opioid overdose deaths. Although meth imports from Mexico simultaneously increased.

So the impact is complex and evolving. The laws may disrupt local meth production but not eliminate availability. More research is needed.

What This Means for Retailers

Regardless of uncertainties around the law’s effectiveness, retailers in New Jersey still need to comply with 2C:35-25 as written. This means training staff on quantity restrictions, following customer ID and record keeping rules, and potentially changing inventory management procedures.

Violations carry criminal penalties plus risk of losing necessary business licenses. So retailers should consult with legal counsel to ensure their policies and procedures comply fully with the law’s requirements.

The legal restrictions around medicine sales continue to tighten. What once seemed like benign over-the-counter products now require strict controls under New Jersey law. Managing that complexity takes effort but pays dividends by avoiding stiff criminal penalties.