Minnesota section 152.137 is not a single “drug around a child” offense. It contains separate methamphetamine-location, methamphetamine-exposure, and fentanyl-exposure crimes. The state must prove the particular clause charged, including knowledge, the substance or item, the child or vulnerable-adult status, and the required location, exposure, contact, or permission.

The current statute is broader in some respects than many people expect. Methamphetamine manufacturing or storage can be charged in a multi-unit residential building or hotel room even without proof that a child was standing next to the item. Fentanyl, added to the statute in 2025, has a different formulation: the state must prove the accused person knowingly caused or permitted a child to inhale, be exposed to, contact, or ingest fentanyl.

These are five-year felonies ranked D3 under the current Drug Offender Grid. A case can also trigger a child-protection investigation, protective custody, adult-protection reporting, controlled-substance charges, and separate sentences. The criminal defense should therefore be coordinated without turning an allegation into an admission in a parallel proceeding.

What section 152.137 prohibits
Children, vulnerable adults, chemicals, waste, and paraphernalia
Methamphetamine manufacturing and storage locations
Methamphetamine exposure and “cause or permit”
The separate fentanyl-exposure offense
Knowledge, control, and attribution
Laboratory, toxicology, environmental, and medical evidence
Search warrants, emergencies, statements, and digital evidence
Child protection and vulnerable-adult reporting
D3 sentencing and multiple convictions
Defense motions and case strategy
Frequently asked questions

What Minnesota Statutes section 152.137 prohibits

Minnesota Statutes section 152.137 contains three principal theories in subdivision 2.

Subdivision 2(a): methamphetamine activity in specified places

A person may not knowingly do any of the following in one of the locations listed by the statute:

manufacture or attempt to manufacture methamphetamine;
store a chemical substance intended for methamphetamine manufacture;
store methamphetamine waste products; or
store methamphetamine paraphernalia.

The listed places include the presence or residence of a child or vulnerable adult; a building, structure, vehicle or other conveyance, or outdoor location where one might reasonably be expected; a room offered for public overnight accommodation; and any multiple-unit residential building.

Subdivision 2(b): causing or permitting methamphetamine exposure

A person may not knowingly cause or permit a child or vulnerable adult to inhale, be exposed to, have contact with, or ingest methamphetamine, a chemical substance, or methamphetamine paraphernalia.

Subdivision 2(c): causing or permitting fentanyl exposure

A person may not knowingly cause or permit a child to inhale, be exposed to, have contact with, or ingest fentanyl. This paragraph protects children; it does not use the vulnerable-adult phrase found in the methamphetamine paragraphs.

Subdivision 2(d) creates a professional-capacity exception to paragraphs (b) and (c) for manufacturers, practitioners, pharmacists, pharmacy owners, nurses, and other persons acting professionally. It does not textually extend that exception to the location and storage conduct in paragraph (a).

Each theory is a felony with a maximum of five years and a $10,000 fine. The complaint should identify the paragraph and specific act. A general allegation that “drugs were present around children” does not state which statutory elements the state intends to prove.

The professional-capacity exception deserves its own proof

Paragraph (d) is broader than a short list of job titles but narrower than a blanket medical exception. It names manufacturers, practitioners, pharmacists, pharmacy owners, nurses, and “other persons” acting in a professional capacity. The analysis should identify the person’s role, license or authorization, task, setting, prescription or order, handling protocol, and whether the questioned conduct actually occurred within professional duties.

A hospital nurse administering fentanyl under an order presents the clearest example. Harder questions can involve emergency medical personnel, pharmacy technicians, home-health workers, hospice staff, transport personnel, or a professional acting outside ordinary procedures. The words “acting in a professional capacity” should be applied to the conduct, not inferred merely from employment.

The exception is textually limited to exposure paragraphs (b) and (c). If the state charges paragraph (a) storage or location conduct, both sides should address the statute’s structure rather than transplant paragraph (d) automatically. Separate licensing, prescription, or lawful-authority provisions may still matter to the facts.

Children, vulnerable adults, fentanyl, chemicals, waste, and paraphernalia

A child is any person under 18. The child’s exact date of birth and the alleged offense date should be established with reliable records when age is close to the boundary.

A vulnerable adult is not merely an adult whom an officer considers vulnerable. Section 152.137 incorporates section 609.232, subdivision 11. That definition includes certain facility residents and service recipients, as well as an adult whose physical, mental, or emotional dysfunction both impairs adequate self-care without assistance and impairs protection from maltreatment. The state should identify the applicable clause and prove it.

“Fentanyl” incorporates section 152.01, subdivision 25, which includes fentanyl, carfentanil, fentanyl analogues, and listed fentanyl-related substances. The laboratory result must identify a covered substance; the street name or an officer’s visual impression is not enough.

A chemical substance is a substance intended for use as a methamphetamine precursor or another chemical intended for methamphetamine manufacture. Common household or commercial chemicals do not satisfy that definition without proof of the relevant intent or intended use.

Methamphetamine waste products include items used in the manufacturing process plus by-products and degradates. Methamphetamine paraphernalia is defined broadly to include equipment, products, and materials used, intended, or designed for manufacture or for injecting, ingesting, inhaling, or otherwise introducing methamphetamine into the body.

Those definitions overlap but are not identical. A bag containing methamphetamine is not automatically “paraphernalia.” A solvent container is not automatically a “chemical substance.” Burned foil, a pipe, a reaction vessel, and household trash require item-specific analysis.

Methamphetamine manufacturing and storage in specified places

Paragraph (a) can be charged without proof of completed exposure. Its focus is knowingly manufacturing, attempting to manufacture, or storing specified methamphetamine-related material in a protected location.

The location list is unusually broad. It covers:

the actual presence of a child or vulnerable adult;
their residence;
a building, structure, conveyance, or outdoor place where one might reasonably be expected;
a hotel, motel, or other room offered to the public overnight; and
any multiple-unit residential building.

A multi-unit building allegation should identify the building and unit, not assume that every property with more than one address qualifies. A hotel theory should establish that the room was offered to the public for overnight accommodation. A “reasonably expected” theory should identify the facts supporting the expectation and the relevant time.

Storage requires more than momentary proximity. The evidence may include duration, container, concealment, ownership, access, purpose, and control. A person who visits an apartment where another occupant hid a chemical is differently situated from a person who deliberately keeps a methamphetamine laboratory in a closet.

Manufacturing and attempting to manufacture require proof beyond possession of ordinary products. Investigators may rely on precursor combinations, equipment, recipes, reaction vessels, odors, residue, waste, purchases, messages, admissions, or expert interpretation. The defense should test whether the collection actually shows an operational or attempted manufacturing process rather than unrelated household items.

“Any multiple unit residential building” is broad but not fact free

The multi-unit language can reach conduct inside one apartment even if no child or vulnerable adult is proved to live in that particular unit. Still, the state must establish that the structure is a multiple-unit residential building and that the accused person knowingly engaged in one of the four listed methamphetamine activities there.

Property-tax labels, rental listings, building plans, leases, photographs, utility records, and testimony can establish the building’s configuration. A single-family home with an informal guest area, an accessory dwelling unit, a duplex under renovation, a mixed commercial building, and a hotel may require different proof. The statutory hotel clause and multi-unit clause should not be blended without identifying which one applies.

The location theory does not prove personal conduct. Even in a qualifying building, the state must connect the accused person to manufacturing, attempted manufacturing, or storage of a defined item. Landlord status, presence in a common hallway, or residence elsewhere in the building is not automatically enough.

Methamphetamine exposure and the meaning of “cause or permit”

Paragraph (b) requires that the accused person knowingly caused or permitted inhalation, exposure, contact, or ingestion. Those verbs should be analyzed separately.

“Cause” ordinarily requires a connection between the person’s conduct and the child’s or vulnerable adult’s contact. “Permit” implies knowledge plus some ability or responsibility to allow the condition. The prosecution should not convert mere presence, family relationship, or residence into automatic permission.

Important questions include:

What substance or item created the alleged exposure?
Where was it located and for how long?
Could the child or vulnerable adult reach it?
What did the accused person know and when?
Who owned or controlled the room, vehicle, container, or item?
Did another adult create or conceal the condition?
Did the accused person take reasonable steps to remove the person or the item?
Is exposure proved medically, environmentally, or only inferred?

The statute lists methamphetamine paraphernalia itself as a possible exposure object. The state should explain how the child or vulnerable adult inhaled, was exposed to, contacted, or ingested the paraphernalia, rather than use the object’s presence as shorthand.

Actual injury is not stated as an element. But the nature and degree of the alleged exposure may affect proof, credibility, charging, sentencing, and any companion child-endangerment or assault theory.

The fentanyl-exposure offense added in 2025

Fentanyl exposure is a separate paragraph with its own proof. It applies when a person knowingly causes or permits a child—not a vulnerable adult—to inhale, be exposed to, contact, or ingest fentanyl.

The statute does not say that any fentanyl located in a home automatically establishes the offense. The state must connect the accused person’s knowing conduct or permission to the child’s alleged exposure. A sealed prescription container in a locked cabinet presents different evidence from loose powder on a surface accessible to a toddler.

Lawful medical use requires careful analysis. Paragraph (d) excludes enumerated professionals and other persons acting in a professional capacity from paragraphs (b) and (c). A patient, parent, or caregiver using prescribed fentanyl may raise different lawful-authority, knowledge, causation, and fact questions even if not named in the professional list. The prescription, administration record, packaging, dose, storage, and medical instructions should be preserved.

Because the fentanyl clause is new, the offense date is crucial. It should not be applied retroactively to conduct before its effective date. Older conduct may implicate other statutes, but it is not made a section 152.137 fentanyl offense by later legislation.

Knowledge, possession, control, and attribution

Every paragraph begins with “knowingly.” Knowledge cannot be supplied merely by a bad outcome. The prosecution may rely on direct evidence—such as an admission or recorded act—or circumstantial evidence including messages, location, behavior, ownership, access, packaging, odor, prior warnings, or attempts to conceal.

Shared spaces require particular care. Several adults may occupy a home, vehicle, hotel room, or apartment building. In State v. Salyers, 858 N.W.2d 156, 160–61 (Minn. 2015), the Supreme Court described constructive possession as “necessarily fact driven” and rejected a rule that made ready access conclusive. Although Salyers involved firearms, its possession analysis shows why courts examine the whole record connecting a person to an item.

Relevant attribution evidence includes leases, vehicle records, keys, locks, personal papers, account ownership, fingerprints, DNA, purchase history, camera footage, access logs, messages, and witness statements. None should be evaluated in isolation.

In State v. Struzyk, 869 N.W.2d 280, 289–90 (Minn. 2015), the court reaffirmed that due process requires proof of every element beyond a reasonable doubt. A jury instruction cannot merge knowing conduct, location, exposure, and protected-person status into a generalized finding of dangerousness.

Laboratory, toxicology, environmental, and medical evidence

These cases often contain several different scientific records:

controlled-substance laboratory testing;
environmental wipe or surface testing;
air, soil, or chemical testing;
blood, urine, or hair toxicology;
medical examination and diagnosis;
photographs and hazardous-material reports; and
expert opinions about manufacture, exposure, or health risk.

Each record answers a different question. A positive surface wipe may show residue at the sampled location but not when it arrived, how it transferred, or who knew about it. A urine result may show exposure within a window but not necessarily the source, date, dose, or responsible person. Hair testing raises collection, external contamination, laboratory, and interpretation questions.

The defense should obtain the complete laboratory file: collection protocol, chain of custody, seal records, blank and control results, calibration, instrument data, reporting threshold, uncertainty, review, and validation material. Sampling location and timing should be mapped precisely.

In State v. Olhausen, 681 N.W.2d 21, 28–29 (Minn. 2004), nonscientific proof sufficed where the accused disposed of the suspected substance and prevented testing. The court distinguished cases where the state retained material but did not adequately test it. When samples exist, confirmatory analysis and proper foundation remain important.

Medical records should be read with context. Symptoms may have multiple causes. Timing, other medications, environmental sources, collection contamination, and clinician assumptions can affect interpretation. A doctor can describe findings; causation and criminal attribution may require additional evidence.

Reconstruct exposure as a sequence, not a conclusion

A useful exposure chart begins before the alleged event. It records when the child or vulnerable adult entered the place, every adult present, where each substance or item was located, barriers to access, observations, symptoms, movement between locations, emergency response, sample collection, medical treatment, and later interviews. The chart should identify the source document for every entry.

This can reveal alternative sources and timing problems. A positive test collected after a child stayed in two homes does not by itself identify which home caused exposure. Residue found after police moved objects or several people entered a room may not establish the original location. A toxicology window can be broader than the complaint’s alleged date.

The same approach tests permission. When did the accused person learn of the condition? Did that person have control over the location or child? What action was possible? Did another adult conceal the item, refuse access, or remove the child? Calling 911, warning another caregiver, locking a container, or leaving the premises can be inconsistent with knowingly permitting continued exposure.

Interview chronology matters too. Children and cognitively impaired adults may be questioned by parents, medical staff, protection workers, and police. Counsel should compare the exact questions, recordings, notes, later summaries, and whether new details appeared after repeated interviews. This review can protect reliable testimony while exposing suggestion or transcription error.

Search warrants, emergency entries, statements, and phones

Investigations may begin with a welfare check, overdose call, fire, hotel complaint, informant, child-protection report, probation visit, traffic stop, or medical result. The defense should build a timeline from the first report through each entry, seizure, interview, test, and agency referral.

An emergency can justify prompt action, but the exception must match the facts known at the time. Once the emergency is resolved, additional searching may require consent, a warrant, or another lawful basis. Body-camera footage, dispatch audio, fire-department records, and warrant timestamps can show the transition.

Warrant affidavits should be examined for informant reliability, corroboration, staleness, nexus, material omissions or false statements, particularity, execution, and inventory. A broad phone warrant deserves review of the authorized accounts, date range, data categories, search method, and actual extraction.

In Rodriguez v. United States, 575 U.S. 348, 354–57 (2015), the Supreme Court held that police may not extend a completed traffic mission for a dog sniff without independent reasonable suspicion. Vehicle cases require the same minute-by-minute attention to the stop and the reason each intrusion continued.

Statements require review of custody, Miranda warnings, invocation, voluntariness, impairment, withdrawal, fatigue, threats, promises, language, and recording completeness. A parent frightened about protective custody may agree with a leading question without admitting knowledge of a substance or exposure mechanism.

Child protection, protective custody, and vulnerable-adult reporting

Section 152.137 authorizes protective custody of a child present where paragraph (a) activity occurs and requires or offers health screening in specified methamphetamine situations. The statute also creates reporting duties when officers suspect a vulnerable adult experienced methamphetamine-related exposure.

A criminal case and child-protection case have different parties, standards, deadlines, discovery, and goals. Statements in one can affect the other. Counsel should coordinate interviews, evaluations, visitation, treatment, safety plans, and document production without advising a client to ignore a lawful order or needed medical care.

Immediate safety steps can be taken without conceding criminal elements. A person may arrange sober supervision, remove hazardous material through lawful professionals, follow medical recommendations, and engage in treatment while disputing knowledge, attribution, causation, or search legality.

For vulnerable adults, adult-protection records may include intake reports, capacity assessments, service-provider records, interviews, and care plans. Those materials can bear on both protected status and the alleged exposure. Privacy and disclosure rules should be handled through proper process.

D3 sentencing, separate counts, and collateral effects

Section 152.137 sets a five-year maximum and $10,000 fine. The 2026 Minnesota Sentencing Guidelines and Commentary rank subdivisions 2(a), 2(b), and 2(c) at D3 on the Drug Offender Grid.

The 2026 D3 row shows fixed durations from 12 months at criminal-history score zero through 23 months at a score of six or more. Many lower-score cells recommend a stayed sentence; higher scores recommend commitment. The offense-date Guidelines edition, exact score, mandatory provisions, and lawful departures control.

Subdivision 4 expressly permits conviction and punishment for other crimes from the same conduct notwithstanding sections 609.035 and 609.04. The Guidelines also list section 152.137 offenses as eligible for permissive consecutive sentencing in specified circumstances. Counsel should not assume all counts merge or run concurrently.

A sentencing worksheet should list every count, victim, substance, subdivision, criminal-history component, custody status, disposition, duration, concurrency question, jail credit, and departure issue. Companion charges may include controlled-substance possession or sale, child endangerment, neglect, assault, weapons, obstruction, or another person-specific offense.

A plea needs a paragraph-specific factual basis

“I had drugs around my child” is not a careful factual basis. A plea should identify the paragraph, substance or defined item, knowing act, protected person, location or exposure mechanism, and offense date. If the state relies on “permit,” the record should establish what condition the person knowingly allowed and the basis for responsibility or control.

The agreement should also say which companion counts are dismissed, whether subdivision 4 permits any surviving punishment, whether sentences are concurrent, and which facts are not admitted. This is especially important when child-protection or civil litigation continues. Unnecessary admissions can travel far beyond the criminal sentencing hearing.

Before accepting a number, counsel should calculate the D3 cell and every count under the Guidelines edition applicable to the offense. A five-year statutory maximum does not mean a 60-month presumptive sentence, and a low fixed duration does not guarantee probation when criminal history or another rule changes the disposition.

Probation can include local confinement, treatment, testing, sober-use conditions, searches, parenting requirements, no-contact or supervised-contact rules, chemical assessment, and compliance with protection orders. Collateral effects can include housing, licensing, employment, immigration, firearm, and family-court consequences.

A defense plan for fentanyl- and methamphetamine-related child or vulnerable-adult charges

1. Identify the exact paragraph and offense date

Separate location or storage under 2(a), methamphetamine exposure under 2(b), and fentanyl exposure under 2(c). Confirm which statutory version applies.

2. Build separate element charts

Chart knowledge, conduct, item definition, protected-person status, location, causation or permission, exposure, venue, and any companion count. Assign original evidence to each element.

3. Preserve physical and digital evidence

Keep photographs, videos, prescriptions, pharmacy records, messages, location data, leases, vehicle records, access information, medical instructions, cleaning records, and names of everyone with access. Do not alter an item or account.

4. Audit every scientific conclusion

Connect each sample to its collection point, person, date, method, result, threshold, and limitation. Do not let a positive test answer knowledge, source, timing, and causation without supporting evidence.

5. Coordinate the parallel cases

Calendar criminal, child-protection, family, licensing, and adult-protection deadlines. Decide how evaluations, treatment, interviews, and testimony in one proceeding may affect another.

6. Negotiate from the actual sentencing map

A plea should identify counts dismissed, the admitted paragraph, D3 score, disposition, jail cap, concurrency, probation conditions, child-protection implications, immigration advice, and what happens after successful completion or violation.

Trial preparation should use the same discipline. Proposed instructions should define the charged substance or item, identify the protected-person category, preserve the statutory mental state, and distinguish location conduct from actual exposure. A special verdict may be necessary when different paragraphs or multiple alleged victims would produce different legal consequences. The verdict should show what the jury unanimously found instead of leaving the conviction resting on an unspecified combination of allegations.

Frequently asked questions about section 152.137 charges

1. Is this offense a felony?

Yes. A subdivision 2 violation is punishable by up to five years and a $10,000 fine.

2. Must a child actually be injured?

Actual injury is not stated as an element. The charged paragraph may focus on prohibited methamphetamine activity in a location or on causing or permitting exposure, contact, inhalation, or ingestion.

3. Must a child be physically present for a paragraph 2(a) charge?

Not always. Paragraph (a) also lists a child’s or vulnerable adult’s residence, places where one might reasonably be expected, public overnight rooms, and multiple-unit residential buildings.

4. Does any chemical stored in a home qualify?

No. A “chemical substance” must be intended as a methamphetamine precursor or otherwise intended for methamphetamine manufacture.

5. What counts as methamphetamine paraphernalia?

Equipment, products, or materials used, intended, or designed for methamphetamine manufacture or for introducing methamphetamine into the body. The actual item and context matter.

6. Does the fentanyl paragraph protect vulnerable adults?

Subdivision 2(c) refers to a child. The methamphetamine paragraphs expressly include both children and vulnerable adults.

7. What does “permit” mean?

The prosecution must connect knowing permission to the exposure or contact. Residence or family status alone should not automatically establish knowledge and ability to allow the condition.

8. Can lawful medical fentanyl trigger a charge?

Professional conduct is expressly excluded from paragraphs (b) and (c). Other lawful prescription situations require analysis of authority, storage, administration, knowledge, and actual exposure.

9. Is a positive child toxicology test enough?

It may support exposure, but source, timing, collection, laboratory method, contamination, medical interpretation, and connection to the accused person remain separate questions.

10. Can police remove a child immediately?

Section 152.137 authorizes protective custody in specified paragraph (a) circumstances. Child-protection and criminal proceedings then follow different rules and deadlines.

11. Can there be multiple convictions from the same incident?

Yes. Subdivision 4 permits other convictions and punishment from the same conduct, and the Guidelines identify these offenses for possible consecutive sentencing.

12. Is the offense D3?

Yes under the 2026 Guidelines for paragraphs 2(a), 2(b), and 2(c). The edition in effect on the offense date and the criminal-history score control the presumptive sentence.

13. Can the case receive probation?

Many lower-score D3 grid cells recommend a stayed sentence, but the score, offense date, companion counts, mandatory rules, departures, and case facts must be checked.

14. What evidence should be preserved?

Preserve the complaint, warrant, videos, photographs, prescriptions, messages, medical records, toxicology notices, housing and vehicle records, cleaning records, and names of all people with access.

15. What should happen first after a charge?

Identify the exact paragraph and date, obey protection and release orders, address immediate medical safety, avoid a detailed police interview without counsel, and coordinate criminal and protection-case strategy promptly.

Dangerous circumstances do not eliminate the elements

Fentanyl and methamphetamine exposure can be medically serious. That reality does not permit a court to skip knowledge, attribution, protected status, statutory definitions, location, causation, permission, or scientific foundation. The precise subdivision and original evidence control.

A strong defense protects both safety and due process: it addresses immediate care, preserves the parallel cases, tests the search, audits the laboratory and medical evidence, identifies who controlled the item, and insists that each charged element be proved beyond a reasonable doubt.

Before any resolution, counsel should compare the complaint, medical and laboratory records, native digital evidence, witness accounts, and current statutory text. Small factual differences can change whether the prosecution can prove the charged provision beyond a reasonable doubt.

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