Smell gives away drug factory site
THOUSANDS of pounds of cannabis plants have been discovered inside a Victorian terrace house in Abington as police continue their “war against drugs factories”.
Officers raided the house, in Adams Avenue, in Northampton, yesterday morning and uncovered between 400 and 500 cannabis plants.
The plants had been growing in pitch black bedrooms inside the house, which sold for almost £200,000 in 2006, as well as in the property’s basement.
Police estimated the basement alone had been using the equivalent wattage of 60 electrical heaters, power that was being illegally taken.
A makeshift vent had been created, linking the basement with the chimney, by hacking through the downstairs floorboards.
Pc John Gardener, from the Abington and Weston Safer Community Team, said the raid followed a tip-off from local residents who could smell the plants. He said it was normal for factories to cause significant damage to houses.
He said: “It is fairly normal for these organised set-ups. They will think nothing of bypassing the electricity, putting in transformers and knocking holes in the wall.”
One neighbour, who asked not to be named, said she had become suspicious about the house after smelling wafts of cannabis from the street.
She said: “We have had our suspicions. You could smell it in the street, sometimes you might hear cars in the middle of the night. I have been here for 20 years and the house has always been rented.”
Another resident said it was “disheartening” to find a cannabis factory so close to her family home.
The neighbour said: “I’m not surprised. There was one up the road about a year ago and it is just disheartening isn’t it? They are all over the country and I’m not shocked, you just don’t want it on your doorstep. I am pleased it has closed and I am just surprised it was so close to our house.”
Police yesterday confirmed a 42-year-old man, from Vietnam, had been arrested at the property and was being detained at Weston Favell police station.
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martyn
Wednesday, September 8, 2010 at 10:31 AMTime for the P.C. brigade to retire and kick all these imported criminals out of the country FAST!
willi eckaslyke
Wednesday, September 8, 2010 at 09:21 AMSurely, it's not really as simple as that.
Jillian Galloway
Tuesday, September 7, 2010 at 06:17 PM$113 billion is spent on marijuana every year in the U.S., and because of the federal prohibition *every* dollar of it goes straight into the hands of criminals. Far from preventing people from using marijuana, the prohibition instead creates zero legal supply amid massive and unrelenting demand. According to the ONDCP, at least sixty percent of Mexican drug cartel money comes from selling marijuana in the U.S., they protect this revenue by brutally torturing, murdering and dismembering countless innocent people. If we can STOP people using marijuana then we need to do so NOW, but if we can't then we need to legalize the production and sale of marijuana to adults with after-tax prices set too low for the cartels to match. One way or the other, we have to force the cartels out of the marijuana market and eliminate their highly lucrative marijuana incomes - no business can withstand the loss of sixty percent of its revenue! To date, the cartels have amassed more than 100,000 "foot soldiers" and operate in 230 U.S. cities, and Arizona police are now conceding that parts of their state are under cartel control. The longer the cartels are allowed to exploit the prohibition the more powerful they're going to get and the more our own personal security will be put in jeopardy.
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