18 U.S.C. § 175
Section 175 · Prohibitions with respect to biological weapons
This is the Biological Weapons Anti-Terrorism Act of 1989
Amended 4 times on record
Applied in 24 court decisions — leading case Gonzalez v Raich (2005)
Most recently applied in United States v. Perez (August 2022)
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year.Markers show enactment, consequential amendments, and circuit splits over this section — watch for a citation surge after a change or a disagreement. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
(a) In General.—Whoever knowingly develops, produces, stockpiles, transfers, acquires, retains, or possesses any biological agent, toxin, or delivery system for use as a weapon, or knowingly assists a foreign state or any organization to do so, or attempts, threatens, or conspires to do the same, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned for life or any term of years, or both. There is extraterritorial Federal jurisdiction over an offense under this section committed by or against a national of the United States.
(b) Additional Offense.—Whoever knowingly possesses any biological agent, toxin, or delivery system of a type or in a quantity that, under the circumstances, is not reasonably justified by a prophylactic, protective, bona fide research, or other peaceful purpose, shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not more than 10 years, or both. In this subsection, the terms “biological agent” and “toxin” do not encompass any biological agent or toxin that is in its naturally occurring environment, if the biological agent or toxin has not been cultivated, collected, or otherwise extracted from its natural source.
(c) Definition.—For purposes of this section, the term “for use as a weapon” includes the development, production, transfer, acquisition, retention, or possession of any biological agent, toxin, or delivery system for other than prophylactic, protective, bona fide research, or other peaceful purposes.
Editorial notes U.S. Code · Office of the Law Revision Counsel
Amendments
2002—Subsec. (c). Pub. L. 107–188 substituted “protective, bona fide research, or other peaceful purposes” for “protective bona fide research, or other peaceful purposes”.
2001—Subsec. (b). Pub. L. 107–56, §817(1)(C), added subsec. (b). Former subsec. (b) redesignated (c).
Pub. L. 107–56, §817(1)(A), substituted “includes” for “does not include” and inserted “other than” after “delivery system for” and “bona fide research” after “protective”.
Subsec. (c). Pub. L. 107–56, §817(1)(B), redesignated subsec. (b) as (c).
1996—Subsec. (a). Pub. L. 104–132 inserted “or attempts, threatens, or conspires to do the same,” before “shall be fined under this title”.
Short Title
Section 1 of Pub. L. 101–298 provided that: “This Act [enacting this chapter and amending section 2516 of this title] may be cited as the ‘Biological Weapons Anti-Terrorism Act of 1989’.”
Purpose and Intent
Section 2 of Pub. L. 101–298 provided that:
“(a) Purpose.—The purpose of this Act [see Short Title note above] is to—
“(1) implement the Biological Weapons Convention, an international agreement unanimously ratified by the United States Senate in 1974 and signed by more than 100 other nations, including the Soviet Union; and
“(2) protect the United States against the threat of biological terrorism.
“(b) Intent of Act.—Nothing in this Act is intended to restrain or restrict peaceful scientific research or development.”