Saturday, 7th November 2009
Freed khat importer seeks compensation for time in custody
A Somali man who was cleared by an appeals court of charges of importing illegal drugs - khat leaves not in the schedule of banned substances - is demanding compensation for having spent a year under preventive arrest.
Aweys Maani Khayre was caught with 10 kilos of the leaves in his luggage after disembarking from a London flight in May 2008.
He filed a judicial protest yesterday against the Attorney General and the Commissioner of Police, claiming he had suffered huge losses as an effect of being held "uselessly" for such a long time. When he had been charged in court last year, he had admitted wanting to use the khat to celebrate his birthday with family and friends but insisted he was not aware the plant was illegal in Malta.
The plant, Catha edulis, has been chewed by east Africans for hundreds of years and plays a big part in the social lives of both men and women. But it is banned across America, Canada and most of Europe, although legal in Britain.
Defence lawyers José Herrera and Veronique Dalli had argued that, since their client had imported the plant and not the active extract, cathinone and cathine, he was not committing a crime.
Magistrate Miriam Hayman had found him guilty and handed down a six-month prison sentence but by that time he had already served more than the jail term in preventive custody, so he was freed.
He appealed the sentence and last July was acquitted in a landmark ruling that held that prohibited substances that occur naturally in plants could not be deemed automatically illegal.
The court had pointed out that khat was not scheduled as an illegal drug and the fact that the plant could contain two banned substances did not make an importer guilty.
Dr Herrera and Dr Dalli signed the protest.
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Comments
You cannot grow the poppies handed out in poppy day..since they are fake poppies..that's just symbolic (poppy/morphine/heroin in the case) are sometimes useful in cases of excrutiating pain in war and it may save lifes.
However we all know recreational drugs are another story..such as heroin cocaine khat mdma ...when you end up planting seeds in an alien country to sell its product...chewing it all day...killing each other to control its supply...then we know it's not good for society at large.
so don't confuse a symbolic gesture with real threaths.
. Let's first start with cigarettes, cigars, than alcohol, and then prescription drugs that are banned in Malta but not the countries that wrote the prescriptions…
Cough up the Euros and apologize to this man for this diabolical injustice.
24 April 2009
In their appeal, lawyers Josè Herrera and Veronique Dalli reiterated their argument that Mr Khayre could not extract one of the two stimulants the plant contains by simply chewing it. They drew a parallel with alcohol being illegal in Muslim countries. Despite this fact: "no one was ever accused of being in possession of alcohol for having been in possession of grapes," they argued in the note of appeal.
Khat was mentioned also when there was that big fight between the illegal immigrants.
With the same argument if I claim to be a rastafari (which I'm not, but was an argument used in US and ended up in the supreme court) I have the right to smoke cannabis? That is what the court is mentioning by its rulings? Is it not a discrimination between cultures and religion if one can have his traditional drug and the other not? Please someone explain
They should be deported & enjoy chewing their wares as is their custom in their own home country. No health benefit is perceived in indulging in such a chewing practice.
Enough is enough!!!
No Joseph. Its not an injustice. It's simply a technicality like the one that let off the Marsden this week. The law should be amended so that any type of drug whether listed or not will incur liability unless it is prescribed to the person in a reasonable amount. This is to take care of medicines but takes into consideration any plant used as a drug and any newly developed drug.
THC in hash is illegal but can I grow sativa cannabis and in this case since THC occurs naturally within the plant it's OK?
I guess this needs clarification.
To those that said that MAlta should do what the EU does. In the Netherlands and in most other places in the EU the personal use of cannabis is tolerated and nobody is prosecuted for it. You can also grow plants in your home and it is also accepted.
So I agree, let's do what the EU does and move forward, maybe we can start using more marijuana and less alcohol and heroin, and finally loose the no 1 spot of heroin addiction that you can all read about in the EU document about drug abuse.
The police keep asking for imprisonment of the presumed innocent and the courts grant this because until now both parties had nothing to lose. I hope that this shameful state of affairs will soon end.
Page 13 in the Times of Malta was a beacon on human rights issues in Malta in the 80s. It is a great pity that the internationally respected gentleman who used to write this column no longer does so.
In thisway the EU does the legwork, and Malta follows 'best practices' and Malta is not always playing catch up in it's legislation for banned substances.
If this Somali guy can prove he was gainfully employed while in Malta then he has a point - if not then he should be immediately deported, with no recompense except the airline ticket to Somalia.