In the last five years there has been a considerable increase in cannabis clubs in the province of Alicante, whose activity often ends up crossing the legal border by becoming a point of sale and also a production point for different drugs.
This is how Alejandro Fernández, Deputy Lieutenant of the Guardia Civil in Torrevieja, explained the situation in an interview to the Spanish press this week.
It should be noted that in Torrevieja alone, 7 clubs have been shut down in recent weeks and 19 people have been arrested, including Brits. In total, they seized drugs with a market value of 120,000 euro, and 12,000 euro in cash, which gives a good clue to the reason for the rise of this parallel activity in this type of association: “high profit”, deduces Fernández.
Torrevieja alone increased from 2 registered clubs a few years ago to 15, so why the increase?
We don’t know exactly. I believe that, from what we have seen, they are very profitable. So, in the end, they have gone from being a place of shared consumption, which is what the law establishes, to becoming a point of sale for drugs and that is very profitable. Hence, they have people working inside, they are located in very central establishments, with a very good position…
“Many people think that there is a legal vacuum or that it is not regulated, but this is not the case, the Supreme Court has already set a series of requirements on cannabis clubs”.
The “club” is a place where substances cannot be stored, but only those that are going to be consumed in a single act. On the other hand, it has to be people who are already consumers, that is, you cannot initiate a person to consume in an association. These cannot have any type of advertising, nor can the premises be seen from the outside, because it is a very intimate place that cannot be accessed by anyone who is not a consumer or a member.
“You can never take the drug out of the premises, that is, the drug has to enter, and all the drugs that have entered the premises have to be consumed in that same act”.
“So, a person can never leave that place with drugs. It is a very clear point within the requirements. The fact of not being able to get the drug, because at the moment that there is drug that is leaving the premises, then it is possible that we are talking about a drug that has been acquired, and therefore we are consuming outside and the film automatically changes, since it is not the same”.
“The jurisdiction also speaks to us about the number of associates, the number of partners. We are talking about a small number of maximum 30 partners. In all the meetings that we are seeing, they keep a record of the people who enter, we are talking about lists of 200, 300 members, even lists that are not carried out many times, precisely because of the number of people they have”.
So, all these clubs have to have their respective association registered, right?
“Yes, you have to register in the register of food associations. Many present the documentation, they are not able to sign up, they are not able to register, and yet they continue to operate in a store anyway. Others, on the contrary, do manage to register, they are registering, but carrying out an activity that is completely different from what an association is, having a much higher number of members than is contemplated, or simply filling out the accounting, allowing behaviours that cannot be carried out, for example, taking the drug out of the establishment”.
“In all the clubs that we have closed due to a temporary sentence, they had an incredible amount of drugs inside and a fairly important storage”.
How much can they have stored so as not to break the law?
“It depends on the members who are consuming at that moment, they must have the permitted doses. It is very similar to the doses that are allowed on the street, which are the doses that can be consumed in about five days”.
What penalties do those detained face for this activity?
“The imputation is only made to the president, secretary and treasurer of the association. Consumers are not charged with any crime. There are also times when workers who had been working have been detained, but the penalties are probably different”.
Have you found other drugs that are not marijuana?
“Yes, we have found not only drugs inside, but marijuana, hashish, but even in the associations themselves we have found places where drugs were grown. That is to say, they had what is the manufacture of products, of the plant, the cutting, the drying, with all its ventilation system, automatic irrigation… And also, the production of hashish, which is something that was not seen here in the area and there are some associations that were in charge of making their own hashish and cannabis derivatives that end up being aromatic concentrates to flavour biscuits, for example”.
Are the managers and consumers of these clubs Spanish or foreigners? Taking into account the high rate of foreigners residing in Torrevieja.
Well, we have everything. Yes, it is true that there are a large number of foreign consumers who go to the associations, because in the end it is a very public place and it saves you from having to meet the town dealer. In the end, it is a place where on many occasions they were included with reviews on Google, where you could perfectly see that they were selling in the reviews because there were comments like “I love the substances that they give here or I have been very satisfied, it is very cheap”.
“On the other hand, for foreigners it is more of a point of sale where they go, pick up the drugs and leave”.
“I have been very impressed by the naturalness with which they thought they were not doing anything wrong”.
“Many of the presidents, the secretaries, the founders of the association were not Spanish, so perhaps it is possible that they come from other countries that have different laws that do contemplate the fact of being able to sell drugs in establishments and there are others, on the contrary, who do know that they are doing it wrong, but think that there has been, as we have discussed before, a legal vacuum, a lack of regulation and that what they are doing is very difficult to be considered a crime”.
What countries are we talking about?
“Especially from the English where there are the so-called Grow Shops, which do sell cannabis products, it is not consumed inside. Maybe there’s a bit of ignorance coming from there”.
Taking into account the size of Torrevieja, do you think it is already a city free of illegal cannabis clubs? Or are they still going to have to make full use of them?
“No, we are aware that there are even more clubs, it has not yet been proven and we have open operations in this regard, but as things are today, 90% of the cases of clubs here in Torrevieja are carrying out illegal activities, for not say the whole, so it is very strange that there is an association carrying out the functions of a totally legal association, that the association that we enter if we ask for documentation, I am not talking about opening an investigation, the fact of simply entering and requesting the accounting sheets, the Partner sheets, in most cases or lack them, or do not have them”.
“Because in the end, the issue of cannabis is the first step to the next level, which are slightly harder drugs that cause total dependence that leads to crime at the level of theft, inside the vehicle, petty theft and generates a great feeling of insecurity”.
