Ruling on drugs set to affect hundreds of cases

The fallout from a landmark court ruling is wider than thought with hundreds of cases involving the sale of certain drugs set to be dropped, the Irish Examiner understands.

The Court of Appeal ruled that a variety of drugs, such as ecstasy and new synthetic drugs, were not illegal as the mechanism used to declare them controlled substances was unconstitutional.

The passing of emergency legislation in the Oireachtas yesterday moved to rectify this, but legal experts pointed out that new laws cannot be applied retrospectively to cases of drugs supply currently going through the criminal justice system.