A British Columbia Supreme Court judge has stayed trafficking convictions and ruled parts of Controlled Drugs and Substances Act are invalid after two activists were convicted of selling to people in order to reduce the harms of toxic drugs.
Justice Catherine Murray ruled Tuesday that sections of the act are unconstitutional, tossing out convictions against Jeremy Kalicum and Eris Nyx who founded the compassion club known as the Drug User Liberation Front.
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Murray found the act infringes upon the rights guaranteed under Sections 7 and 15 under the Charter, although she has suspended her ruling for six months to give Parliament time to implement a plan that would allow for a non-medicalized safer supply program to operate.
Kalicum and Nyx were convicted of trafficking last year after admitting to buying the pure drugs on the dark web, then selling them to the club’s members.
Murray’s ruling says that running such a safer-supply program was precisely what the applicants were doing and that formed the basis of the criminal charges against them.
She says the applicants in this case have borne the burden of bringing a successful constitutional challenge, doing a public interest service at considerable cost to themselves.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 29, 2026.









