CANNABIS GROUP ATTACKS 'UNJUST' PENALTY

Supporters have condemned the choice of 'pain or prison' given to
cannabis campaigner Stuart Wyatt by a Plymouth judge.

The Legalise Cannabis Alliance (LCA) said that people in constant
suffering such as 36-year-old Wyatt should not be penalised by the
law.

Wyatt, pictured right, of St Mary Street, Stonehouse, was sentenced
to eight months in prison for producing cannabis and 12 months for
supplying the drug, to run concurrently.

But Judge Francis Gilbert suspended imprisonment for two years at
Plymouth Crown Court on Friday.

Wyatt, who has a working diagnosis of chronic fatigue syndrome but is
also being tested for multiple sclerosis, admitted using cannabis for
medicinal purposes. He often turned the drug into a paste which he
rubbed on to his body.

He also admitted that he supplied the paste to other people in
pain.

The court heard that police had visited Wyatt and found quantities of
cannabis and a small hydroponic growing set-up.

A spokesman for the LCA said: "This is an outrageously unjust
misapplication of the law.

"The Misuse of Drugs Act was supposedly created to try to protect
people from the risks of harm from certain drugs, not to prevent
people from growing a few plants to use to ease their pain and suffering.

"How can it be just to send a man to prison, or to torture him by
keeping him away from pain-relieving plants when he has caused no
trouble, done no harm and posed no threat?

"It is a sad day for British justice when the law is misapplied in
this way -- when an innocent man gets punished. The judge rightly
said that nobody is above the law -- which proves beyond doubt that
the law now needs to be changed."

Wyatt faces a prison sentence if he is caught producing or supplying
cannabis again in the next two years. He refused to say outside the
court whether he would give up the drug.