Your first day dealing drugs or selling blow jobs? Well asking “are you a cop?” won’t help screen your customer base for police.

     Do people still believe asking if you are a cop will save you before you commit your criminal act? Apparently so, despite a million online resources that will tell you otherwise. I guess people are still watching old 70’s blacksploitation movies where this apparently was the screening method.  To convince yourself if won’t work, start with Snopes, or do your own online search.  If you are still not believing, call your Georgia Criminal Defense Attorney and ask him directly.

     In the meantime, let’s talk a little bit about the three things that you have to prove to show entrapment in Georgia.
(1) the idea of the crime started with the police officer
(2) the defendant did the crime because of undue persuasion, incitement, or deceit
(3) the defendant was not predisposed to commit the crime
     Now before you get all excited about #2, remember that all three have to be shown for a successful defense of entrapment.

     OH YEAH! I almost forgot.  Entrapment is what is called an affirmative defense to the crime.  That means that to start arguing that you were entrapped, you have to first admit that you did the crime.  Maybe admitting that you did the crime isn’t a big deal, but it is showing that you have come to the last gasp of your legal defense.

So anyway, back to those three things you have to show to prove entrapment.
     FIRST, you have to prove that the police officer initiated the idea of doing the crime.  An undercover officer pretending to be a drug dealer is NOT initiating the crime.  You driving up to that undercover agent (in your station wagon with the kids in the back seat) and asking to buy “half a slab for fifty” is not entrapment, it is you committing the crime of attempted possession of cocaine, even if the undercover cop only has wax pellets to sell you.  See Guzman v. State, 206 Ga. App. 170. (1992).
     SECOND, you have to show that you did the crime because the cop somehow tricked or coerced you into it.  Keep in mind though, that even if the undercover agent becomes extremely irritating by asking you repeatedly over a two week period to sell him hard drugs, he didn’t trick you or coerce you.  Garrett v. State, 133 Ga. App. 564. (1974).
     Additionally, if the police have a really hot female undercover informant, just because your little head took over control and made you do what she told you to do that still isn’t entrapment.  That’s just part of being a dumb guy. Lightsey v. State, 289 Ga. App. 181 (2008).
     THIRD, you have to show that you weren’t predisposed to committing the crime anyway.  So, don’t even think about an entrapment defense working if you are caught on tape voluntarily going to, and feeling completely comfortable in, a meeting where you are discussing the sale of 400 grams of meth.  Urapo-Sanchez v. State, 267 Ga. App. 113 (2004).

     Don't want to read all that caselaw?  Just call your Georgia Criminal Defense Attorney.