DIFFERENCES IN LEGISLATION AND JUDICIAL PRACTICE BETWEEN MEMBER STATES OF THE EUROPEAN UNION, IN THE MATTER OF DRUG POSSESSION FOR OWN CONSUMPTION AND DRUG POSSESSION FOR ILLICIT TRAFFIC AND CONSUMPTION (English version)

Legislation in the drug regime in the Union Europe is not uniform and it differs from state to state. The difference existent in the legislation of the states of the European Union reflects in the different attitude of the institutions empowered in preventing and combating traffic and illicit drug consumption, in the way the law is being applied as well as the priorities and resources allocated by these institutions to specific problems. Most part of the crimes related to the breach of the legal regime of drugs aims at drug possession for own consumption or for illicit traffic. The reality indicates that the implication of drug consumers in committing crimes of illicit traffic in the member states of the European Union is based on two motivations. In the first place, the drug addicts are implicated in illicit traffic with the purpose of obtaining amounts of money necessary in order to finance own consumption, which is very costly. The second motivation would be their involvement in illicit traffic with the purpose of obtaining consistent incomes or other material goods. Given these motivations, in the judicial criminal practice of the member states of the European Union the issue of precisely establishing if those quantities of drugs the offender was caught with were for personal consumption or for illicit traffic. According to the purpose followed by the offender based of the evidence administrated in the file, the judicial classification differs as well as the sanction that would be applied by the judicial instance.