Indoor pot farms catch on in suburban settings

http://www.sacbee.com/content/news/v-print/story/14257184p-15071938c.html


Indoor pot farms catch on in suburban settings


Elizabeth Hume -- Bee Staff Writer
Published 12:01 am PDT Friday, May 19, 2006
The lawn is patchy and pocked with weeds. Overgrown
rose bushes and shaded windows suggest neglect. But
inside the house on Haven Court in Greenhaven, a
professional gardener's touch abounds.

Sophisticated lighting and perfect growing conditions
made the residence an ideal marijuana farm, according
to Sacramento police. Almost every room in the
two-story suburban home near Caroline Wenzel
Elementary School had been adapted for the care and
nurturing of almost 2,000 plants, authorities said.

The sophisticated operation is typical of what law
enforcement says is the newest trend in the marijuana
trade to hit Sacramento -- growing pot quietly and
unseen in the midst of middle-class suburban
neighborhoods.

"From the outside the homes look normal, but inside
they're strictly used for marijuana cultivation,"
Sacramento Police Detective Chou Vang said.

Sacramento police have discovered at least 10 houses
used exclusively for marijuana cultivation during the
last year, Vang said. In one case from 2005, four
people, all in their early 20s with connections to
three homes, were found guilty of multiple charges of
marijuana cultivation, said Sacramento Deputy District
Attorney Leslie Monahan, who prosecuted the case.

"They are literally just raking in money. It is
purely just profit," Monahan said.

The trend is relatively new to Sacramento, having
swept south from British Columbia and Ontario, Canada,
where home cultivation has been popular for years,
authorities said. The "marijuana grow houses" also
have started springing up in Florida and Puerto Rico,
Drug Enforcement Agency officials said.

In the Bay Area this month, 12 people face charges of
marijuana cultivation after authorities found a vast
network of indoor hydroponic-type grows in three homes
and three warehouses in the East Bay and Santa Cruz,
U.S. attorney's officials said.

The farm within Sacramento's Haven Court residence
came to the attention of police May 11. A neighbor
reported a prowler creeping around the home about 8:10
p.m., Sacramento Police Sgt. Terrell Marshall said.

Officers checked the home and found an open back
door, Marshall said.

They walked in and discovered 379 nearly mature
marijuana plants and 1,400 smaller plants in the
living room, dining room and four bedrooms.

The street value of the plants and equipment was
almost $1 million, he said.

Marshall said the suspects are still at large.

The owner of the home, Hung Dang, said his family
purchased it four years ago as a rental and inherited
the tenants from the previous owner. The family owns
several rental properties, he said, and did not have
regular contact with the renters or visit the
property.

"I just found out about it. I had no idea," Dang
said.

Law enforcement officials said that the best way of
stopping the indoor growth is by educating homeowners
and neighbors about the problem.

"Police are becoming a lot more effective at finding
these grows as the public becomes more aware of the
problem," said Constable Sal Baslione, a spokesperson
for Niagara Regional Police, a city in Ontario,
Canada, of more than 400,000 people. Baslione said his
department receives about two reports a month of
marijuana "home grows."

"It is a problem, there's no doubt about that,"
Baslione said.

There are challenges to growing hundreds of marijuana
plants in a home designed for growing families.
Powerful lights must simulate the movement of the sun.

Drip systems must be installed.

Fans and timers are required. In the case Monahan
prosecuted, beams had been installed in the ceilings
to hold the sophisticated system.

And the equipment burns far more energy than a family
of four.

At the Haven Court home, the growers tapped into a
SMUD electric line and hijacked power so their
excessive energy usage wouldn't register on the
utility meter, Vang said.

"That can be extremely dangerous," Vang said. "They
had to know what they were doing."

Indoor plants are typically smaller than marijuana
grown outdoors.

But they have other appeals, said Gordon Taylor,
assistant special agent in charge of the Sacramento
office for the DEA.

Outdoor marijuana seeds are planted in April and
harvested in September, providing one yield each year.
Indoor plants grow much faster. They require only 60
to 90 days to cultivate and can be grown year-round,
Taylor said.

"They're not going to get as large a plant, but they
make up for it by getting four harvests a year,"
Taylor said.

Another benefit to indoor cultivation is the plant
buds have a higher level of tetrahydrocannabinol, the
main chemical in marijuana, authorities said.

Growers in Western Canada use indoor cultivation to
produce highly potent marijuana called "B.C. Bud."
Outdoor buds have a THC level of 8 percent, while B.C.
Bud can reach 20 percent, Taylor said.

"It's extremely potent, but very expensive," he said.

The type of marijuana found in the Greenhaven home
isn't as potent as B.C. Bud, Vang said. But it is
stronger than outdoor marijuana and sells at $5,000 to
$7,000 a pound on the street, Vang said.

Authorities don't need agricultural expertise to
understand the motive.

"It's very lucrative," Vang said.