‘Prince of Pot’ tries to get busted for selling banned merchandise

Longtime cannabis policy reform advocate Marc Emery, also known as the “Prince of Pot,” failed in his first attempt to get arrested for selling goods that promote cannabis culture in downtown Montreal on Sunday. But he vowed to keep trying. Emery was hoping to get arrested to shine a light on, and eventually challenge in court, what he calls the hypocrisy of Quebec’s Cannabis Regulation Act, which prohibits, for example, the use of the cannabis leaf symbol to sell items that are not cannabis. “The government is trying to usurp our culture,” he told the Montreal Gazette in an interview. “They take it over and monopolize it, and then they ban our cultural references.” At noon, Emery parked himself and his table of wares on the sidewalk outside the legal government-run cannabis store on Ste-Catherine St. W. For the next two and a half hours, he proceeded to loudly hawk, at discount prices, a panoply of pot-related items that he says are now illegal to sell in Quebec because they contravene the province’s Cannabis Regulation Act. “Buy your illegal cannabis culture items here!” shouted Emery at passersby and at the dozens of customers lined up outside the Société québécoise du cannabis (SQDC) store near the corner of Ste-Catherine and Metcalfe Sts. On the table and in boxes and bags in front of him were T-shirts and sweatshirts, flags, cookie molds, rolling trays, lighters, buttons and stickers sporting the marijuana leaf symbol or the number 420, as well as sundry items bearing slogans that could be interpreted as promoting marijuana use or making health claims about its benefits. “All these things are illegal in Quebec under the Quebec Cannabis Regulation Act,” Emery shouted. “You can’t (sell) any products with 420 on it, or the cannabis leaf or any kind of promotional sayings, so I’ve got T-shirts, illegal banned flags, and everything is a lot cheaper than normal because I’m not really doing it for the money. I’m just trying to get charged.”

Emery says he purchased the items from Montreal-area cannabis accessory stores that had to take them off the shelves after Quebec’s legislature passed Bill 157 last June, which governs the use of recreational cannabis and how it can be sold and promoted. Quebec’s Cannabis Regulation Act states that “Any operator of a business selling, giving or exchanging a product that is not cannabis and contains a name, logo, slogan associated directly with the SQDC, a brand of cannabis or an authorized producer” is liable for a fine of $2,500 to $62,500. The act also states that “any person ... not complying with the standards established by the government in matters of promotion” of cannabis is liable to a fine of between $5,000 and $500,000.” A high-profile promoter of the legalization of cannabis in Canada for decades, Emery, who is originally from London, Ont., and now lives in Toronto, has been charged multiple times and in various jurisdictions with cannabis-related offences. He served more than four years of prison time in the U.S. for selling mail-order cannabis seeds to customers in the U.S. He was fined $195,000 after his illegal cannabis shop in Toronto was raided by police and closed in March 2017. And in December 2016, he was arrested and charged for his role in the opening of six illegal Cannabis Culture franchises in Montreal and for distributing cannabis joints at one of those shops during its opening event. He pleaded guilty to various charges and was fined a total of $6,500. But Emery was recognized and congratulated by several passersby on Ste-Catherine St. on Sunday. “Thanks a lot for your life’s dedication to the cause,” said one 44-year-old computer programmer who declined to give his name, saying the stigma around marijuana use is still alive and well. He bought a baking pan for making cookies in the shape of marijuana leaves. Emery seemed to be gently chiding the SQDC customers as they lined up in the cold to purchase their legal pot. “I see you are all in line to buy factory-farmed weed from soulless corporations, whose presidents have probably never even smoked marijuana, providing the weed for a government monopoly that only months ago, persecuted all of us and would have arrested us if we were doing the same thing. Isn’t progress wonderful?” While Emery said he had been hoping to be hauled away in handcuffs, it did not happen this time. Two SPVM officers showed up around 2:30 p.m. and threatened to charge him under a municipal bylaw that prohibits retailing items outside without a permit. Emery tried to explain that he wanted to be charged for contravening Quebec’s legislation on cannabis, but they said they were not prepared to enforce that legislation at this time. When they threatened to seize his wares, he decided to pack up and move along. “I’ll have to come up with a new strategy where I won’t be deterred by some municipal bylaw,” he said, suggesting he may try to get a permit to set up a pop-up shop. He hopes to challenge the Quebec’s Cannabis Act as “unconstitutional, an abrogation of basic Charter rights.”