ICEERS | September 16, 2025
Some lives leave their mark in books, while others do so in our hearts. Diego de las Casas Cañedo achieved both: a pioneer in the legal defense of ayahuasca and those who shared it, as well as in the fight to end the legal and economic persecution of cannabis users, he was a dear friend to those who knew him: generous to a fault, infectiously funny. His recent passing has robbed us of a lucid and courageous lawyer, but above all, a luminous human being with a heart of gold and a mind of platinum.
Diego was returning from Boom Festival in Portugal, a festival he often attended to spread love, smiles, and enthusiasm on the dance floor. He had just bought a three-wheeled motorcycle, seeking greater safety on the road. But fate had other plans. Our friend suffered a car accident and, after several weeks in an induced coma, just when it seemed he was beginning to recover, an opportunistic antibiotic-resistant bacterium took his life.
With a law degree from the San Pablo CEU University and specialized training in legal practice, bankruptcy law, and taxation, Diego possessed impeccable technical knowledge. But what set him apart from his colleagues was his courage: he confronted judges, prosecutors, courts, and technicians from the Spanish Medicines Agency and the National Institute of Toxicology with clear and educational arguments, dismantling the absurd logic of criminalizing practices that, from both a legal and formal point of view, do not constitute a crime.
In the early stages of the Ayahuasca Defense Fund, his contributions were fundamental. He explained with simplicity what seemed like a mystery to others. “If the whole cannot be regulated, the part cannot be regulated either,” he repeated, with that mixture of legal logic and common sense that characterized him so well. With regard to cannabis, his logic was equally compelling: even if the plant appears on the list of controlled substances, if it is not psychoactive in a certain form—as science demonstrates by analyzing specific concentrations of cannabinoids—then it cannot be considered a drug.
A free spirit
Those of us who knew him know that Diego was much more than a brilliant lawyer. He was a lovable man, an exquisite host, a free spirit. We shared parties, raves, and trips of all kinds with him, preferably with Shpongle’s soundtrack to liven up the day. His open laughter, sharp humor, warm presence, and dazzling gaze turned any encounter into a refuge beyond space and time. Diego is not dead. He is eternal, and he has left before the rest of us to reserve the best spot for us at the tremendous party that is surely being celebrated on the other side of the mystery.
Diego was a man of a thousand jackets: multifaceted, versatile, capable of going from a meeting in high society to a conversation with homeless people on the street without ever losing his composure. He had a radically open approach to the world: he listened without judging, shared without calculation, and gave himself unreservedly. You could just as easily find him in a courtroom defending a defendant as dancing in a nightclub or traveling to the Nevada desert to enjoy Burning Man and celebrate life in all its dimensions.
At his funeral, in every conversation, the same words were repeated: “Diego was one of my best friends” or “I had a special relationship with him.” Diego had that gift: no matter how much time you spent with him, you always felt like you had formed a unique bond. It wasn’t about how many moments you shared, but the quality of those moments.
Among the many messages received after his passing, a close friend wrote a letter to his family from London. In it, he remembered Diego as someone who “always made you feel at home, because he saw the diamond in every person,” and evoked his contagious joy: “Things had to be danceable, he would repeat to me, and little by little you realized how right he was.” Words that remind us that Diego is still present in every gesture of kindness and every smile. Another friend also recalled, in those days of mourning, how Diego had the extraordinary ability to perceive what each person needed and to offer it to them without hesitation.
Diego loved Carol madly, along with his two daughters, Martina and Violeta, and an entire community that feels him as part of their family and will continue to remember him for the rest of their lives. We are left with his example: combining justice with compassion, law with tenderness, struggle with celebration. Every time Shpongle plays, when a festival brings us together, while someone defends a plant in court, Diego will be there, reminding us that justice requires common sense and that life, even in the midst of tragedy, deserves to be celebrated, for time is not measured in years, but in intensity, friendship, and shared love. Fly high, my friend!
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