Pubdate: Sat, 02 Nov 2002 Source: Recorder & Times, The (CN ON) Copyright: 2002 Recorder and Times Contact: http://www.recorder.ca/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2216 Author: Megan Gillis Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mjcn.htm (Cannabis - Canada) GROW HOUSE OPERATORS DESERVE SERIOUS JAIL TIME: RUNCIMAN Unless Canada wants to stay in the ranks of Colombia and Mexico, people who grow pot to sell should get prison time - not a slap on the wrist, Minister of Public Safety and Security Bob Runciman will tell the feds next week. "The profits are so high and the penalties are so low there's no risk," he said Friday during a visit to the Leeds County OPP detachment. "The police use fishing terminology - catch and release. "Police dedicate all those resources to shutting these people down, then they're right back in business. We're looking for penalties that will deter this activity - stiff, minimum penalties." Runciman will press the federal government, after consulting with his counterparts from across Canada, at a meeting of federal and provincial justice ministers in Calgary next week. At minimum people who grow marijuana for the purpose of trafficking should get prison time - which means at least a two-year sentence - and a significant fine, he argues. This country has become the third largest supplier of marijuana to the United States. If the federal government doesn't take action Canada will face increasing pressure from the Americans to stop the flow of marijuana, potentially disrupting the movement of legitimate travellers and commerce across the border, Runciman said. Police estimate that there are 700 grow houses - indoor hydroponic pot labs - - operating in Ontario, most linked to organized crime, and that marijuana is now the province's third biggest cash crop at $1 billion a year. In this area, grow houses have been busted in Mallorytown, near Maynard, and in Hillcrest Park west of Brockville in the past year. The value of drugs seized at the three houses was more than $1 million. The Ministry of Public Safety and Security reports a small indoor grow of 50 plants can yield a grower $55,000 a year, but no jail time. A conditional sentence - house arrest - is typical or a short, 60- to 90-day jail term. An average grow of 300 plants yields $350,000 a year and sentences ranging from house arrest to nine months in jail. Large-scale growers, up to 20,000 plants and profits of $30 million a year, typically face 18-month sentences. Brockville Police Chief Barry King heads the Canadian Centre for Substance Abuse. Police in British Columbia tell him they have so many grow houses they shut them down without charging anyone. The problem is growing here, too. "The reason is in court people were getting conditional sentences and probation," King said. "These are traffickers and they're getting probation. If judges don't get the message - we're not talking about sending someone with three joints to jail but give these people some deterrents - we as police can't talk to judges." But the federal government can, in the form of minimum sentences, King said. The Kingston-based OPP drug enforcement unit destroyed more than 4,100 plants - worth as much as $4 million - in two days flying above Leeds and Grenville with a helicopter this summer. And that's just the pot police don't have enough evidence to tie to a suspect and simply want to get off the street. There were also several major busts and arrests, including at a Prescott-area farm and near Junetown, "Overall we're down and the reason for that is that the growers are catching on," said Detective-Constable Glenn Holland of the drug enforcement unit. "The larger their plots the more obvious they are for us to find. They're still out there." Police didn't find booby traps at pot grows across the province this year. But they did encounter spiked boards hidden between plants, picked up a crossbow dropped by a suspect and found razor blades embedded in plant stems. In one case, a man was hurt in a shoot-out in Killaloe between pot growers and people trying to steal their plants. "We have a guy shot through the throat protecting a pot stand," Holland said. "This certainly isn't the peace-loving hippie. This is violence and drugs - organized crime. "Drugs are a big part of their financial empire. They'll protect $100,000 worth of pot as quickly as they'll protect $100,000 worth of coke." Holland didn't want to tell the courts how to do their jobs. But he acknowledged that police officers feel tougher sentences would be more of a deterrent. "(The courts) don't see it as a violent crime," he said. "Drugs do invite a great deal of violence." - --- MAP posted-by: Jo-D