Young TikTok User Jailed: 15 Months for Smuggling 14,500 Joints Worth of Cannabis

The defendant was traveling from Algeciras to the Paris region in a Flixbus, with 7.3 kilos of cannabis pollen carefully hidden around his waist and back. He was arrested during a random customs check at the Saugnac-et-Muret (Landes) toll booth, reports Sud Ouest. At the hearing held in Mont-de-Marsan, the customs representative stated that "about 14,500 joints" were found on the young man. "What did you want to do with this huge amount of cannabis?" asks the judge. "I don’t know, I wanted to consume part of it," the defendant vaguely responds.

At the stand, the defendant explains that he "accidentally" came across the TikTok profile of a user filming cannabis fields, during his vacation in Tangier, Morocco. "We got in touch, I saw that the prices were interesting and that’s it," he elaborates. The public prosecutor accuses the young man of drug trafficking, revealing that he has been consuming cannabis since adolescence. But the defendant rejects these accusations. For the prosecutor, the amount of cannabis he claims to have bought "does not match that of personal consumption."

During his arrest, the suspect had 4,000 euros in cash in his possession. "If we were to retain the qualification of drug trafficking for all the mules we find, we wouldn’t get out of it!" reacts Me Takoudju, the defendant’s lawyer, who recalls that no element of weighing or reselling was found at the defendant’s home. Finally, the accused, already convicted of aggravated violence and receiving stolen goods, was sentenced to a term of fifteen months in prison, accompanied by a customs fine of 110,000 euros.