If someone says he’s intending to get high, you’d expect him to be about to smoke a joint or maybe climb a mountain. David Theiss had another plan. He aimed to get high by licking the venom glands of a Colorado River toad. Not everyone’s idea of a good time, but then human pleasure covers a wide and varied canvas.

Theiss was arrested by police in Kansas City for possessing the toad “with the intention of using it as a hallucinogen”. He was granted bail and it remains to be seen whether he will be given a custodial sentence. The toad was kept in custody.

What if the same thing happened here? English law on prohibited drugs and substances is complicated. There are over 250 substances covered in the Schedules to the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971. Most are synthetic but some are found naturally. Opium, for example, is the coagulated juice of the opium poppy. Bufotenine, a Class A drug, occurs as a secretion of the common toad and the natterjack toad. The secretion can make people ill and kill some animals.

Under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981, it is an offence to intentionally kill, injure, take or possess a toad, as it is a protected animal. But the House of Lords has ruled that the offence of unlawful possession of a drug under the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 isn’t established just by proof of the possession of a natural material (which, yes, would include a toad) of which the drug is one of the unseparated ingredients.

The world's weirdest cases

From the man who sued God to the man who sued TV for making his wife fat, people turn to lawyers for the strangest things

So, under English law, no-one has ever been arrested for possession of a toad with intent to slurp it.

Professor Gary Slapper is Director of the Centre for Law at The Open University

Explore Law

• Columnists

• Law Panel

• Law Reports

• Student Law

Times Recommends

• BGC 'set aside £40m to lure Tullett brokers'
• Legal aid review to ensure value
• Fears as 21 magistrates' courts face closure