Seized cannabis supplies sold off in gov't sanction auction

The government put cannabis cultivation equipment, similar to equipment recently confiscated by the police, up for sale in an auction in April. This includes equipment such as carbon filters, extraction systems and a grow tent - items that grow shops are not allowed to sell since the legislative amendment that took effect on March 1st, NRC reports. The auction was organized by the Ministry of Finance's Domains Service. According to Domains, the items were placed on auction on a misunderstanding and were eventually withdrawn. Nico Kwakman, lecturer in criminal law at Groningen University, called the fact that the equipment appeared on an auction site just after the entry of the new "preparing for or facilitating illicit crops" law, a "big miss". According to him, it shows the lack of clarity that the new section entails - exactly when the sale of these materials is punishable is still a "shadowy area". The extractor that was placed on auction was recognized by a wholesaler in farming products in Brabant, according to NRC. Identical items were seized from his business in a major police raid and were likely destroyed. "That an identical extractor has no been put up for auction confirms our picture that the confiscation of such items has not yet been well thought out", lawyer Frank van Ardenne, who will soon be defending the wholesaler, said to NRC.