Social Justice for the first 101 persons who will benifit from this country’s passage and proclamation of the new Amendment to the Dangerous Drugs Act, set to become Law this Monday 23rd December. AG Faris Al-Rawi started laying out the process for the first 101 persons who have been in prison for possession of marijuana when the herb is decriminalised.
The AG also said the records of 85,000-plus people who were before the courts in the past ten years for marijuana possession will be expunged.
The decriminalisation of marijuana is set to take place on Monday when Her Excellency President Paula-Mae Weekes is expected to proclaim the Dangerous Drugs (Amendment) Act 2019.
Al-Rawi detailed the process, which included senior counsel Fyard Hosein who has been hired to lead a team to start the process of freeing the 101 persons- which includes 14 children who are in rehabilitation centres. There can be no batch pardons so the painstaking process will go one by one starting with this first 101.
“They are in the course of getting the files as we speak. We know the names, we know the numbers, we know the courts, we know the conviction date, we know the estimated date of release, we know the latest date of release, we are working with known data, I literally have every person’s name in front of me right now,”
He also said that has written to the Prisons Commissioner and he also spoke to Chief Justice Ivor Archie and Police Commissioner Gary Griffith who are also critical in the process.
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