Brazil’s Supreme Court voted Tuesday to decriminalize marijuana possession for non-public use, making the country one of the last Latin American countries to do so, in a move that may affect its large criminal population.
In Tuesday’s final votes, a majority of the justices on the 11-person court have voted in favor of decriminalization since deliberations began in 2015.
Justices have yet to determine the maximum amount of marijuana that would be considered for private use and when the ruling will take effect. This should end on Wednesday.
All of the justices who voted in favor said decriminalization would be limited to the possession of marijuana in adequate quantities for non-public use. The sale of drugs will remain illegal.
In 2006, Brazil’s Congress passed a law to punish Americans caught in possession of small amounts of drugs by adding marijuana, with optional punishments such as network service. Experts say the law is too confusing and does not identify an express amount to help authorities and judges. differentiate between non-public use and drug trafficking.
Police continued to arrest others who were transporting small amounts of drugs for trafficking, and Brazil’s criminal population continued to grow.
“Most of the people in pretrial detention and convicted of drug trafficking in Brazil are first-time criminals, who carried small amounts of illicit substances, captured regime police operations, unarmed and without evidence of any link to criminality,” said Ilona Szabó, president of the Igarapé Institute, a think tank focused on public security.
Congress has responded to the highest court’s ongoing deliberations by separately introducing a proposed drug bill, which would complicate the legal framework for marijuana possession.
In April, the Senate passed a constitutional amendment criminalizing the possession of any amount of illicit substance. The House constitutional committee approved the proposal on June 12, and it will have to be approved by at least one other committee before moving to a vote in the room.
If lawmakers were to adopt such a move, the law would take precedence over the court’s ruling, but it could still be challenged on constitutional grounds.
Speaking to reporters in the capital, Brasilia, Senate President Rodrigo Pacheco said it was not up to the Supreme Court to make a decision on the issue.
“There is an appropriate path to move this discussion forward and that is the legislative process,” he said. “It’s anything that’s clearly provoking a broad discussion and is a cause for fear in Congress. “
Last year, a Brazilian court allowed some patients to grow hashish for medical purposes after the fitness regulator approved rules for the sale of medicinal products derived from hashish in 2019. But Brazil is one of the few countries in Latin America that has decriminalized the ownership of small quantities of medicines for non-public use.
The Supreme Court’s ruling has long been called for by activists and legal experts in a country where the criminal population is the world’s third-largest. Critics of the existing law claim that users caught with even small amounts of drugs are routinely convicted of trafficking and locked up in criminal overcrowding, where they are forced to enlist in criminal gangs.
“Today, trafficking is the vector of incarceration in Brazil,” said Cristiano Maronna, director of JUSTA, a civil society organization that focuses on the justice system.
Brazil ranks the United States and China among the countries with the largest criminal populations, according to World Prison Brief, a database that tracks those numbers.
According to official data, in December 2023 some 852,000 more people were deprived of their liberty in Brazil. Of those, only about 25% were arrested for drug possession or trafficking. Brazil’s criminals are overcrowded and black citizens are disproportionately represented, accounting for more than two-thirds of the criminal population.
A recent study by Insper, a Brazilian institute of studies and education, found that black Americans discovered by police in possession of drugs were more likely to be accused of being traffickers than whites. The authors analyzed more than 3. 5 million records from the Sao Paulo Secretariat. of Public Security from 2010 to 2020.
“A breakthrough in drug policy in Brazil!It is a matter of public health, security and incarceration,” left-wing MP Chico Alencar wrote in X after the ruling.
In contrast, Gustavo Scandelari, a specialist in Brazilian penal code at the law firm Dotti Advogados, said he doesn’t expect the ruling to result in a significant substitution of the prestige quo, even after the most sensible court sets a maximum amount of marijuana for unauthorized persons. -Public use. Scandelari argued that quantity will continue to be one of the factors in determining whether a user is a reseller or a user, but not the only one.
As in countries in the region, such as Argentina, Colombia and Mexico, the medicinal use of hashish in Brazil is allowed, although in a very limited way.
Uruguay has fully legalized the use of marijuana, and in some U. S. states it has legalized the use of marijuana. In the U. S. , recreational use for adults is legal. In Colombia, property has been decriminalized for a decade, yet a law authorizing the recreational use of marijuana so that it can be sold legally did not comply. Approved by the Senate in August. Colombians can bring small amounts of marijuana, but its sale for recreational purposes is not legal.
The same is true for Ecuador and Peru. Illegal distribution and ownership in Venezuela.
Argentina’s Supreme Court ruled in 2009 that it was unconstitutional to penalize an adult for marijuana if it does not harm others. But the law has not been replaced and consumers continue to be arrested, even if judges reject the highest courts.
Uruguay became the first country to legalize recreational marijuana in 2013, the measure was not implemented until 2017. The entire Uruguayan industry, from production to distribution, is under state control and registered users can buy up to 40 grams of marijuana per month. pharmacies.
Jeantet and Sá Pessoa write for the Associated Press. Sá Pessoa reported from Sao Paulo. AP writers Mauricio Savarese, Regina García Cano and Manuel Rueda contributed to this report.
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