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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.
On October 24 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,
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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.
It is worth mention that this
marijuana
judgment
coincided to
a period
when the
Constitutional
Court
perceived in
society as
an angry one
and
confronting
with
parliament
which is the
result of
the Court’s
previous 16
September
2015
judgment in
the case the
former
Tbilisi
mayor George
Ugulava v.
Parliament.
This
judgment
enabled one
day freedom
to George
Ugulava, who
has
corruption
charges and
is
imprisoned.
After that
judgment of
the
Constitutional
Court, on
the one hand
the majority
MPs from the
ruling
party, among
them the
chairman of
parliament
and on the
other the
chairman of
the
Constitutional
Court made
confronting
statements
against one
another.
The Constitutional Court has not
released an
official
judgment
yet, which
abolishes
the use of
imprisonment
for purchase
and keeping
of marijuana
without the
intention of
sale, which
will enable
the public more
important
and positive
details to
know, but it
should be
also
mentioned
that the
Court did
not rule on
the
decriminalization
of marijuana
because it
was not a
subject of
the dispute
and a claim in
this case.
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