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Cannabis Campaigners' Guide News Database result:
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UK: Posh pad cannabis farmers pay a heavy price
Tamsin Davis Swindon Advertiser
Friday 25 Aug 2006 A VIETNAMESE couple have been jailed for cultivating hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of cannabis. Tung Pham, 20, and his girlfriend Thi Nguyen, 32, could be thrown out of the country after completing their 21-month sentences. The couple were arrested after police stumbled on a sophisticated cannabis farm in a residential Liden street last month. Rob Welling, prosecuting, said officers were called Okebourne Park at 8pm on Saturday, July 22 to reports of a stabbing. continued... "They could hear people inside but there was no answer at the door," he told Swindon Crown Court. "They took the decision to force entry and they found what they would describe as a cannabis factory. All four bedrooms were used entirely for cannabis plants. There was lighting, wiring, chemicals and fans and what is described as a sophisticated set up to grow cannabis on a commercial scale. "In particular, the police discovered that a sophisticated set up to abstract electricity had also been installed." He said the device meant that only some power was taken through the meter while the rest bypassed it so as not to alert the electricity board to what was going on. Between 180 and 200 plants were recovered, which had an estimated street value of about £300,000. He said: "As the police entered the front door the defendants exited by the rear door and they were arrested." They told how they had met a man in a market in Lewisham, south London, who had arranged for them to live in Swindon. Having paid them a £200 lump sum, he bought them food, paid the rent and told them how to cultivate and harvest the plants. They were also advised not to go outside. Nguyen said she had been in the country since 2004 having paid a Vietnamese company $11,000. Pham told police he had arrived in Britain on the back of a lorry after crossing several countries. Mr Welling said it was accepted that they were farm labourers' and not involved in any other properties raided across the town in recent weeks. Nguyen and Pham, of no fixed abode, both admitted being concerned in the cultivation of a class C drug. Claire Marlow, defending, said: "It is more than likely both will be deported after completing their sentences. In Mr Pham's case I think it is inevitable." She said both had agreed to do the work as they needed to raise cash to send home to pay people who had got them to Britain. However, shortly before the raid she said they had wanted to get out, but had been threatened by the boss. "They were in a catch 22 as they had no other work and were given this opportunity and realised it was illegal," she said. "To a certain extent these are both victims. They are both vulnerable. Whatever employment they could get in this country it is low paid, if they can get it." She said Pham was keen to be deported as his mother had late stage terminal cancer and had sold her home to pay for his route to Europe. Judge John McNaught said: "You each played a small but important part in a very well organised business." Four Vietnamese immigrants who are charged with the production of cannabis will reappear at Swindon Magistrates' Court next month. Two men, 26-year-old Tam Thanh Cao, of Padstow Road, and 45-year-old Tan Van Truong, of Edgar Row Close, Wroughton, appeared before magistrates yesterday and were remanded in custody until they come before the court on Thursday, September 7. A 36-year-old woman, Nhung Thi Le, of Padstow Road, was also remanded to appear before magistrates on the same day. The fourth defendant, 18-year-old Phoung Thu Luu, of Padstow Road, was also remanded in absence on illness grounds after recently giving birth. Fightback EARLIER this month the Adver-backed Swindon Drugs Hotline was launched in an effort to free our town of the misery caused by the drug trade. The phone line allows people who are concerned about drug dealing in their area to phone and leave information anonymously. And the tip-off system is already paying dividends with police revealing in yesterday's Adver they are following up a number of leads in east Swindon. http://www.thisisswindon.co.uk/display.var.893647.0.posh_pad_cannabis_farmers_pay_a_heavy_price.php
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