Astonishing Appeal Court Ruling On Medicinal Cannabis
Peter Bridle. In Jail. In Pain.
According to the Northampton Chronicle & Echo:
“A RETIRED soldier who turned his house and shop into cannabis factories has had his sentence sliced on appeal - because he needed the illegal drug for a medical condition.”
Read that again: “…because he needed the illegal drug for a medical condition.”
This is an astonishing ruling from the Appeal Court that creates a precedent. It is in line with the new sentencing guidelines. It seems to enshrine in law the truth that cannabis is medicine.
It directly contradicts the Home Office and therefore the government’s position.
Lord Justice Moore-Bick, sitting with Mr Justice Kenneth Parker and Judge James Goss QC, cut Bridle’s sentence to three and a half years, of which he will serve less than two years behind bars.
He ruled: “In the circumstances of this case the judge ought to have given the appellant full credit for his guilty plea and some additional credit for his personal mitigation. There is evidence that he had various complaints including muscular dystrophy.”
This is real progress.
The tragedy is that Peter Bridle remains in jail, deprived of his liberty and of the medicine that the law now acknowledges he needs for pain from his muscular dystrophy.
Surely, this must be “cruel and unusual punishment” in the meaning of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which is enshrined in British law and the US constitution?
The cruelty and hypocrisy of cannabis prohibition in Britain is crumbling. All that is needed is for a committed legal team of solicitors and barristers to take these issues through the courts.
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