 January the 13th the National Smartshop Association (VLOS.nl) went to court to demand an emergency appeal against the ban on shrooms. The shroom industry has been slaughtered on lies and unscientific grounds. On January the 18th the court agreed that our case is important and will speed up our appeal. Report of that meeting:
“Decided is to lodge an urgent appeal. In this, we assume that both the State and the Court of justice want to cooperate with the lodging of urgent appeal. Disadvantage is that in that case, all grounds with the lodging of the appeal (writ of summons) have to be indicated. This at least means a lot of homework for the jurists on a short term.
Furthermore, the lawyer will checked the judgment of the facility judge and commented on it.
-- The facility judge remained at the very careful side and makes himself very comfortable on many points, even when he indicates that the VLOS scores points. The rejection of the claims of the VLOS by the Facility judge is straightforward disappointing. It seems like the Facility judge expressly leaves the door open for appeal to let the real decisions be made in a higher court. However, the framework of the dispute is reproduced well.
-- Distinctive is that the thesises of the State are not supported by a single scientist, while all consulted experts agree with the VLOS. The wafer-thin position of the State is also proven from this.
-- The judge has rejected the argument that only the legislator can change the law. This is a potentionally dangerous decision that opens the way to legislation by means of a mandate. With this, the separation of powers is broken. In Belgium, an attempt to break this separation of powers has lead to a straight government crisis.
-- The Opium Act states that substances can be added to list II when is proven that the usage could lead to damage to the society and the health. The question is what the meaning of the word could is and to what extent the conditions that the law states need to be considered cumulative. The Facility judge did not agree with this thesis and establishes that a (very low) approachable condition for the Minister comes up. He establishes that it then is about a policy decision of the Minister that is free. At the least little thing, the Minister can adjust the law and add substances. From research of jurists is proven that this does not agree with the genesis of the law. The appeal will expressly go into this.
-- The judge also establishes that no causative connection between the ‘incidents’ and the usage of magic mushrooms is proven. This is an important establishment because if no low threshold for the Minister is valid, he will have wuite a heavy burden of proof to prove the danger of the magic mushrooms for the public health. The report of Griffiths will also not help the Minister then because Griffiths has never examined magic mushrooms but only the operation of synthetic psilocin and/or psilocybin. Synthetic psilocin (psilocybin) is already on list I and does not have to be examined further for the legislation. The Minister compares apples and oranges and takes the wrong decision based upon that and does not want to listen to professional advice.
-- Meanwhile, Dr Griffiths also put the authority of his research into perspective by point to the specific circumstances and targets of the research and that it is not correct to take parts of his report and raise these to basis for legislation. That is ‘too quickly assumed’. This point will also be weighty in the appeal. The jurists will get in touch with Griffiths.
-- Concerning the claim, the Facility judge decides that no factually expropriation comes up (which means that every useful usage became impossible and no economic value remains). This decision is also taken on the basis of doubtful grounds and cannot persist."
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