In August 2013, a group of four led by Juan Francisco Torres Landa, a lawyer and secretary general of México Unido Contra la Delincuencia, a civil society group dedicated to improving public security and justice, decided to take action to force the Mexican justice system to enter the debate on drugs, arguing that the present prohibitionist policies have contributed to the violence from drug trafficking organisations (DTOs) ravaging Mexico while the country’s marijuana production (95% of which goes to the US) provides them with a major source of income. Torres co-founded an entity known as Sociedad Mexicana de Autoconsumo Responsable y Tolerante (Smart) and filed a suit against the government before the SCJN on the constitutional grounds that prohibition denied them “the right to the free development of personality” and hence a dignified life. The first chamber of Mexico’s SCJN ruled by 4-1 in favour of the four plaintiffs in the case, who are now legally entitled to produce and consume marijuana for recreational use.

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