Set them free

Social activist Hamilton Lashley is making a call for drug accused incarcerated for cannabis to be freed.

Lashley argued that while the Mia Amor Mottley-led Barbados Labour Party (BLP) administration is moving full steam ahead to legalise marijuana for medicinal purposes, the cases of those imprisoned on marijuana charges, whether on remand or serving sentences, should be reviewed by the law courts.

“I believe that all those in prison now that are currently facing sentences, when they put their case at the Magistrates’ court, and say that they use it for medicinal purposes, their cases should be reviewed and they should be set free, once it becomes legal.

“You can’t introduce a new piece of legislation and don’t try to validate the Act, by looking at those persons who have been sentenced. Some of them up there for two, three years. Some of them have as long as five-year sentences.

The former Member of Parliament said it would be a conflict of interest if a law legalising cannabis for medicinal purposes is passed, but there are people imprisoned who in their defense had said they used it for medicinal purposes.

“There must be instant reviews of those persons in my view, who have been unfaired by the legal system,” Lashley said.

Prime Minister Mottley said there is no doubt that Government will put a framework in place for medical cannabis. The local Rastafarian community has been pushing for the administration to decriminalize marijuana use for religious purposes.
anestahenry@barbadostoday.bb