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Cannabis Campaigners' Guide News Database result:
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UK: Man employed to water cannabis gets prison term
Hemel Today
Tuesday 26 Sep 2006 An illegal immigrant from Vietnam was employed to water the plants in a Hemel Hempstead drug factory. Van Ha Nguyen from East London had the keys to the house in Claymore in the town. At St Albans Crown Court on Wednesday he was jailed for 18 months after admitting a single charge of cultivating cannabis. Judge Geoffrey Breen said he was also recommending that at the end of his sentence, 26 year old Nguyen is deported back to Vietnam. Alexander Krikler, prosecuting, told the court how on April 23 this year police officers in a light aircraft that had thermal imaging equipment on board, detected an unusually high amount of heat coming from a house in Hemel Hempstead. They were able to pinpoint the property as a house in Claymore and as a result Herts Police began an operation to establish what was going on there. Officers with secret video camera recorded the comings and goings and caught the defendant visiting the house. On April 27, said Mr Krikler, officers raided the three storey terraced house and found a drug factory in operation. The entire top floor consisting of four bedrooms was being used to cultivate cannabis plants. Special lighting and lamps had been installed along with fans and pumps. All the windows and walls had been covered in foil sheeting. Officers found 302 cannabis plants as well as 227 viable cuttings. The court was told an expert had estimated the operation was capable of producing a high quality yield of skunk to the value of 121,000 pounds. Not only that but the operation that had been set up could produce three harvests in a year. Mr Krikler said Nguyen of Cromarty House, Ben Johnson Road, Mile End, East London was arrested near the house and on him were found a set of keys to the property. At Hemel Hempstead police station he tried to make out he had found the keys on a train that morning but eventually admitted his role. He said that after meeting a man in London he had been asked to water the plants at the house. Nguyen claimed that he had been to the house on only one other occasion before his arrest. Louise Oakley defending said the defendant had come to the UK in 2002 and asked for asylum. But his request had been turned down prompting him to disappear. He had then worked in the hotel industry in the Midlands before working in nail bars in London. The court heard he had begun a relationship with a woman, also from Vietnam and they now had a two month old child. "He says he came to the UK for a better life. He wanted to further his education," said Miss Oakley. She added "It was not his cannabis factory and he was not to reap the rewards outlined by the crown." The barrister said Nguyen had been paid just 300 pounds for his part. Passing sentence Judge Breen said the offence crossed the custody threshold. He told him "You knew this was a large operation and were playing an important role". Had the plants not been watered, said the judge, they wouldn't have thrived. He sentenced Nguyen to 18 month imprisonment, less the 145 days he has spent in custody since his arrest. http://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/ViewArticle2.aspx?SectionID=1240&ArticleID=1787811 contact: http://www2.hemelhempsteadtoday.co.uk/forms/contactedit.html
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