Georgia: Imprisonment for purchase and possession of marijuana is unconstitutional

Levan Jorbenadze

On October 24, 2015 in the case of Beka Tsikarishvili v. Parliament (application 592) the Constitutional Court of Georgia declared as unconstitutional the imprisonment for purchase and keeping of marijuana for personal use. The court ruled that imposing such punishment is mainly a torture, cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment.

The Constitutional Court made a big and progressive step for changing the repressive drug policy of Georgia and took a heavy burden out of the society, which in general one more time highlighted Georgia’s rank in democratic index in the region and at an international level.

According to the official website of the Constitutional Court where the information published on 24 October 2015 the court notes that purchase and keeping of 70 grams of marijuana for which the applicant is charged cannot be indicative towards the purposes of sale or its real intent, and imposing the imprisonment amounts to torture,

cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment confronting the Article 17 of the Constitution. Article 17 § 2 of Georgian Constitution provide: “No one shall be subjected to torture, cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment”.

The Court further notes that current legislation considers 50-500 grams of marijuana as a large amount. The Court considers that keeping 70 grams of dry marijuana do not represent such an amount which might indicate to the intention of sale of drug. The court noted that legislature have an obligation to form such provisions which will enable a judge to find the fact if there is an intention of sale during purchase or keeping of marijuana or probability of such an intention and finally impose the imprisonment only in the case of established intention of sale.

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Thumbnail: Flickr CC Mrozinski