The Court of Cassation authorizes the sale in France of CBD products

Published on : 06/23/2021 – 6:55 PM

The decision was eagerly awaited by CBD traders. On Wednesday, June 23, the Court of Cassation rendered a judgment quashing a previous judicial decision which had ruled illegal the sale of products based on cannabidiol (CBD), a non-psychotropic cannabis molecule.

The judgment overturns a judgment of the Grenoble Court of Appeal in a case concerning the Foxseeds sign, which offered products from cannabis for sale.

His manager had been prosecuted for breaking drug laws. He was initially released, before being found guilty again by the Court of Appeal.

“The Court of Appeal did not justify its decision”

This sentence was pronounced on the basis of the French regulations on cannabis dating from August 1990, which stipulate that only “cultivation, import, export and industrial and commercial use (fibers and seeds) “varieties of cannabis with a content of THC, a euphoric and addicting cannabinoid, not exceeding 0.20%.

The court of appeal had also stressed that the products which had been seized in the shop consisted of flowering cannabis tops containing THC in the state of traces, the possession of which is illicit.

However, considers the Court of Cassation, “by pronouncing thus, without investigating, whereas it was invited to do so, if the seized substances had not been legally produced in another Member State of the European Union, the court of ‘appeal did not justify its decision “.

The Court of Cassation is based in this sense on a judgment rendered in November 2020 by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) which recalls that the principle of the free movement of goods within the EU is opposed to that one of the Member States prohibits the marketing of CBD if it is legally produced in another Member State.

Stricter unjustified regulations

“Therefore, CBD must be able to be marketed even if it is extracted from the entire plant, while French regulations only accept its marketing if it is extracted from fibers and seeds”, indicates the Court of cassation in a press release.

Stricter regulation can only be justified for the protection of public health, she recalls, and must not go beyond what is necessary to achieve this goal.

The Court of Cassation made it clear on Wednesday that it did not, in this case, decide the question of whether or not France can validly avail itself of this objective of protecting public health to prohibit the possession and marketing of CBD in its territory.

With AFP