Last Updated on 17th February 2020

Sammy Ben Rabah, the former owner of hemp cafe and dispensary Canna Kitchen in Brighton, has been charged with intent to sell cannabis after his business was raided last year.

In May 2019, Canna Kitchen was raided by police under the suspicion that Ben Rabah was selling illegal cannabis products containing THC. Ben Rabah maintains that all his stock was perfectly within the law.

Since the raid last year, Ben Rabah has closed the shop and moved to Bristol. But this week, police announced that he and another Brighton business owner – Naomi Morris, who sold CBD products in her shop Hemp Life – had both been charged with intent to supply cannabis.

A police spokesperson said “A man and a woman have been charged with possession with intent to supply cannabis after police executed warrants at shops in Duke Street and London Road, Brighton.

“Following an investigation into the supply of class B drugs, officers searched two businesses in the city in May last year, seized a significant quantity of cannabis and arrested two people.

“Sammy Ben Rabah, 32, of Barrow Court Lane, Bristol, and Naomi Morris, 37, of North Place, Brighton, are each charged with two counts of possession with intent to supply cannabis and will appear at Brighton Magistrates’ Court on 12 March.”

Both business owners insist that all products were either legal CBD or industrial hemp, which is also legal in the UK.