JAKARTA - The struggle of Reynhardt Rossy Siahaan, the medical marijuana user, is broken. Today 22 June, the Panel of Judges at the Kupang District Court found him guilty and sentenced him to 10 months in prison. The Narcotics Advocacy Civil Society Coalition for Health regretted this decision.
Previously, Rossy's decision was postponed on Thursday 18 June because a member of the judge was sick. Now the Panel of Judges has sentenced him to article 127 of Law Number 35 of 2009 concerning the abuse of narcotics with a maximum imprisonment of four years.
The judge indeed reduced his demand by two months from the one previously charged with one year. While Rossy did not appeal. "He accepted his verdict and now he has served seven months in prison and has not filed an appeal," Rossy Legal Counsel Harie NC Lay told VOI.
Meanwhile, the Civil Society Coalition for Narcotics Advocacy for Health, consisting of ICJR, IJRS, LBH Masyarakat, LeIP, Rumah Cemara, EJA, Yakeba, LGN, argued that the decision did not consider Rossy's reasons for using marijuana to relieve pain from the neurological disease he suffered. In fact, said the Coalition, through a written statement received by VOI, Rossy should have been able to escape the lawsuit.
"In these conditions, Reyndhart Rossy should be able to fall into the category of forced force as regulated in Article 48 of the Criminal Code. Therefore, Reyndhart Rossy should be free from all lawsuits," he wrote.
Apart from having to be released, the sentence of imprisonment for 10 months clearly injures the sense of justice. This verdict even exceeds the jail term which has reached 7 months, in other words Rossy still has to serve 3 months in prison.
"Practices like this will only increasingly show the failure of narcotics policies in Indonesia. And show that someone can be imprisoned because the state does not provide access to the treatment that its citizens need," he concluded.
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