Story highlights
- Court of appeals rules certain parts of drug law are unconstitutional
- The catch: It's still illegal to sell the drugs
- Irish government is rushing to fix law
(CNN)Let's just say -- hypothetically -- you found yourself in possession of Ecstasy while in Ireland on Tuesday.
No worries. Everything was cool, because it wasn't illegal Tuesday.
Wednesday could be a different story.
An
appeals court ruling invalidating one section of the Misuse of Drugs
Act 1977 made the controlled substances it had regulated legal for at
least one day.
The Independent
newspaper of the United Kingdom said Ecstasy, ketamine and magic
mushrooms were three of the temporarily legal drugs.
The Court of Appeal ruled those drugs and others had unconstitutionally been added to Section 2 of the law.
"We
prepared for this possibility. Legislation was prepared and approved in
advance by Cabinet," Minister for Health Leo Varadkar said in a written
statement.
The government had to get
the new legislation through parliament so the drugs added to the law
since 1977 could be considered illegal again.
It should happen within 24 hours, the Department of Health said Tuesday.
Drugs such as cannabis, cocaine and heroin remained illegal as did the sale of "psychoactive substances."
The
Independent said past convictions for some drug offenses will be called
into question but The Journal of Ireland said the court's decision will
impact only cases currently in the judicial process.
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