With most crimes, the action has to be completed before the law has been broken. A person is not going to be arrested until after they have carried out that illegal activity, and police are going to gather evidence to show that they were the perpetrator and demonstrate how they broke the law.
But with conspiracy charges, the person in question does not necessarily have to complete the illegal action. Simply being part of the conspiracy itself is illegal. People will often argue that they have not actually done anything wrong if the conspiracy is discovered before it has been fulfilled. But they may still face high-level conspiracy charges all the same.
Illegal drug transportation
One example of this could be if two people conspire to illegally transport drugs. Perhaps they are not involved in the manufacture or the sale of those drugs, but they are just going to transport them from one state to another. This makes it a federal crime.
In order to be a conspiracy, at least two people need to be involved, and they must take one specific step toward completing that conspiracy.
In this example, two people could exchange email messages, setting up the plan to transport the illegal drugs. They could then rent a U-Haul, which they plan to use to move the drugs across state lines.
If they were then arrested, they may correctly claim that they never picked up the illegal drugs and never brought them to another state. But they could still face charges because they planned the conspiracy and took a concrete step toward completing it by renting the truck.
This is just one example of how conspiracy charges may be leveled. Those who find themselves facing such allegations need to know what defense options they have.