esp wrote: ↑Sun Aug 08, 2021 12:10 am
Can someone please explain?
If UK grower 1 buys seeds of one of the recent mexican discoveries from UK grower 2, who produced the seeds in cultivation, what law(s) has UK grower 1 broken?
CITES regulations concern trade that crosses International boundaries so grower 1 has not committed an offence under CITES regulation.
If grower 2 imported the original material from Mexico without a CITES permit then that would be an illegal act. However if Grower 2 imported the seed from a cultivated source outside of Mexico with any required CITES documentation (i.e. if a CITES 1 listed species) then that would not, as I understand it be illegal under CITES legislation.
As far as I can see the BCSS is taking a moral, rather than legal stance on the sale of post 1997 Mexican species.
Ali Baba wrote: ↑Sun Aug 08, 2021 10:16 am
As far as I can see the BCSS is taking a moral, rather than legal stance on the sale of post 1997 Mexican species.
Your post has reflected my understanding of the situation, at least with respect to material propagated in cultivation.
I would like to see a clarification of the statement in this month's enews: "Also, the offspring of these plants, raised from seed or grown from vegetative cuttings are illegal and must not be sold at BCSS events."
Is this actually the LEGAL situation, as advised by lawyers with good knowledge of the legislation, or is it merely an assertion by non-experts?
Which takes me back to my previous post - what laws is a UK grower breaking by possessing these plants?
This seems a straightforward question...
I am wondering if there is a distinction here between 'illegal' and 'not legally owned'.
There was a lot of publicity a few years ago when a person who had been offering shares in collecting expeditions in Nepal for decades in alpine gardening publications was revealed to have been collecting without permit. The conclusion was that anyone with this material 'did not have it legally'.
My extrapolation of this is that if you have possession of such material then it remains the legal property of the nation of origin. You cannot legally sell something you do not own. And I guess show rules prohibit exhibition of material you don't own too?
Incidentally. I was reading a Cactusworld from 2015 last night and it happily illustrates two 'illegal' species in the collections of UK growers - including Astrophytum caput-medusae.
Darren nr Lancaster UK. Growing Conophytum, Lobivia, Sulcorebutia, bulbs etc.
esp wrote: ↑Sun Aug 08, 2021 12:10 am
Can someone please explain?
If UK grower 1 buys seeds of one of the recent mexican discoveries from UK grower 2, who produced the seeds in cultivation, what law(s) has UK grower 1 broken?
I believe, and I am no lawyer, that knowing a crime has been committed and not reporting it makes you an accessory after the fact. Which can be prosecuted as a crime, if the authorities wish to do so.
esp wrote: ↑Sun Aug 08, 2021 12:10 am
Can someone please explain?
If UK grower 1 buys seeds of one of the recent mexican discoveries from UK grower 2, who produced the seeds in cultivation, what law(s) has UK grower 1 broken?
I believe, and I am no lawyer, that knowing a crime has been committed and not reporting it makes you an accessory after the fact. Which can be prosecuted as a crime, if the authorities wish to do so.
Only if you knew who had broken the law and broadly how it had been broken - in this case neither person involved seems to have broken a law in this country (or possibly any other).
esp wrote: ↑Sun Aug 08, 2021 12:10 am
Can someone please explain?
If UK grower 1 buys seeds of one of the recent mexican discoveries from UK grower 2, who produced the seeds in cultivation, what law(s) has UK grower 1 broken?
I believe, and I am no lawyer, that knowing a crime has been committed and not reporting it makes you an accessory after the fact. Which can be prosecuted as a crime, if the authorities wish to do so.
Only if you knew who had broken the law and broadly how it had been broken - in this case neither person involved seems to have broken a law in this country (or possibly any other).
If you know a crime has been committed, you don't have to investigate or solve the crime yourself. The police will do that for you. If you see a dead body floating downstream, your civic duty is to report it to the police. Not assume that murder happens so often there is no point doing anything about it.
Ali Baba wrote: ↑Thu Aug 05, 2021 5:12 pm
I have followed this thread with interest, not least because I was responsible for Astrophytum caput-medusae appearing briefly on the BCSS seed list. As a receiver of stolen goods in the form of seed of said species from a well known nurseryman in the USA, and the owner of two plants derived from the seed, plus a guilty conscience from raising and giving away more than 300 seeds from the mother plants, I have a question for those on both sides of the argument.
What should I do now?
Should I destroy my plants?
Should I continue to cross pollinate and give seed away (obviously not via any BCSS meeting or affiliated website )?
Should I let them live and retire them from breeding?
Should I ask the Seed Pool to return my seeds?
What’s the practical decision I should make? What is morally the right thing to do?
Donate them to a properly-recognised Botanic Garden?
I believe, and I am no lawyer, that knowing a crime has been committed and not reporting it makes you an accessory after the fact. Which can be prosecuted as a crime, if the authorities wish to do so.
Only if you knew who had broken the law and broadly how it had been broken - in this case neither person involved seems to have broken a law in this country (or possibly any other).
If you know a crime has been committed, you don't have to investigate or solve the crime yourself. The police will do that for you. If you see a dead body floating downstream, your civic duty is to report it to the police. Not assume that murder happens so often there is no point doing anything about it.
I think we have already established that we don’t know if a crime has been committed as no one has yet suggested what the law is that has been broken in the case of Grower 1
Only if you knew who had broken the law and broadly how it had been broken - in this case neither person involved seems to have broken a law in this country (or possibly any other).
If you know a crime has been committed, you don't have to investigate or solve the crime yourself. The police will do that for you. If you see a dead body floating downstream, your civic duty is to report it to the police. Not assume that murder happens so often there is no point doing anything about it.
I think we have already established that we don’t know if a crime has been committed as no one has yet suggested what the law is that has been broken in the case of Grower 1
"Don't know" is not a defence in law. Grower 1 can ask somebody. But Grower 1 is very aware of the fact that a crime has been committed by someone along the chain of supply. Even if they are in denial about their own criminality. By not reporting that chain of supply, Grower 1 is enabling criminals to continue their vile trade.
A jewelry fancier who receives Mary Queen of Scots' Rosary Beads should report that they have received them so that the supply chain that led to that jewelry fancier can be investigated and the original thief may be caught. What would you think of anybody who reognised that they are Mary Queen of Scots' Rosary Beads then posts a picture of Mary Queen of Scots' Rosary Beads on a public jewelry forum wanting to sell them without having reported it to the police? Is it the civic duty of the people reading that public forum to report the evidence of the crime that they see there?
