Growing marijuana for personal use is still a crime, Italy's highest appeals court said Thursday against the advice of a top official.
The Cassation Court, whose rulings set precedents, came out in favour of a hard line after a series of contradictory verdicts over the last year.
In one of them, a man was let off after persuading a court he was selling the plant as an ornament.
In another, a pensioner was convicted after police found a few pots on her balcony.
The Court's latest ruling makes it clear that it is a criminal offence to grow any amount of marijuana in a domestic setting.
There has never been any issue about larger-scale production of the drug.
Earlier in the day the deputy prosecutor-general at the court, Vitagliano Esposito, argued that growing a few plants for one's own use should be depenalised.
