The Supreme Court of Brazil ruled on Tuesday, June 25, by eight votes out of eleven in favor of the decriminalization of the possession of cannabis for personal use. The decision was taken in a bitter trial that fundamentally divides society in Latin America’s largest country.
According to the judges’ decision, the possession of cannabis should no longer be subject to criminal sanctions, while remaining. “an unlawful act”. The president of Brazil’s highest court, Luis Roberto Barroso, clarified that it was not a question “in no case of legalization” cannabis.
The eleven judges of the Supreme Court must still set the maximum quantity authorized for personal consumption, during a new session scheduled for Wednesday. This long-term trial began in 2015 and has been interrupted several times.
Current legislation, which dates from 2006, makes it an offense to “acquire, possess or transport drugs without authorization”. This offense is provided for in the penal code but is no longer punishable by imprisonment, as was the case in the previous text, which provided for a sentence of six months to two years’ imprisonment.
The 2006 text does not specify up to what quantity of cannabis an individual can be considered a simple user, punished by alternative penalties, such as services of general interest, and not a trafficker, who incurs heavy penalties. This assessment is left to the police, the prosecution or the judges of first instance, without any real objective criterion.
Conservative opposition
During the trial, in August 2023, Judge Alexandre de Moraes had stated that “Young people, especially black people, are arrested as drug dealers if they are caught in possession of much smaller quantities of drugs than white people over 30.”. This subject remains highly controversial in Brazil, where conservative movements are firmly opposed to any decriminalization.
The Senate approved in April a text to enshrine in the Constitution that possession of any quantity of drugs constitutes an offense, including cannabis. This amendment to the Constitution must be examined soon by the Chamber of Deputies.
The use of cannabis for medicinal purposes is also the subject of debate in Brazil. Patients have had to go to court to obtain the right to use treatments based on CBD, the non-psychotropic molecule of the plant, in the case of certain severe forms of epilepsy.
Many countries have decriminalized the recreational use of cannabis, waiving prison sentences for users, but fewer have legalized it, such as Uruguay in 2013 or Germany in February.
