Drugs

In Canada, drug offences are prosecuted under a separate federal law called the Controlled Drug and Substances Act, also known as the CDSA for short. The drugs that are captured under the CDSA are listed in schedules attached to the law. There are 100s of drugs categorized that are illegal. (In 2018, cannabis was repealed from schedule 2 of the CDSA, although there are still many offences that relate to cannabis, however, simple possession of cannabis is no longer a criminal offence). Commonly known illegal drugs such as Cocaine, Fentanyl and Opium for example are included in the schedule of illegal drugs. Under the CDSA there are different types of criminal activities that one can be charged with, such as possession of a drug, trafficking of a drug or cultivating and producing an illegal drug. One can even be charged with drug trafficking if one held out the substance to be a drug when in fact it was not (i.e., selling baking powder holding it out to be cocaine). Drug charges are very serious and can include prescription pharmaceuticals as well.