Pubdate: Mon, 07 Mar 2005 Source: Coquitlam Now, The (CN BC) Copyright: 2005 Lower Mainland Publishing Group, Inc. Contact: http://www.thenownews.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1340 Author: Jennifer Saltman Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/decrim.htm (Decrim/Legalization) Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/topics/Rochfort+Bridge (Rochfort Bridge) Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mjcn.htm (Cannabis - Canada) GROW OPS ALWAYS A RISK FOR POLICE OFFICERS It could easily have happened in the Tri-Cities: four RCMP officers shot dead as they guarded a marijuana grow operation at a rural residence. But the grow-op bust that saw the worst multiple killing of Mounties since the 1885 Northwest Rebellion wasn't in Coquitlam or Port Coquitlam, it was in Mayerthorpe, Alta. Still, there is always risk in the Tri-Cities, where discovery of marijuana grow ops is almost a daily occurrence. The Marijuana Enforcement Team (MET), which was formed in September 2004, has found suspects holed up in crawl spaces, bathrooms and furnace rooms, sometimes brandishing weapons. More often than not, officers find weapons during a grow-op bust, many of them illegal and used by cultivators to protect their investment. The risks from electricity theft, booby traps, explosions and a host of other things can await police. Coquitlam RCMP Cpl. Jane Baptista said officers busting grow ops have a list of things they look for, but there's always the unknown. "Every day we go to work we know there's that possibility ... but it's always a shock if something happens. I mean, it's like having one of your family members go," she said. Flags will be at half-mast at the Coquitlam RCMP detachment until the funerals for Const. Peter Christopher Schiemann, 25; Const. Anthony Fitzgerald Orion Gordon, 28; Const. Lionide Nicholas Johnston, 32; and Const. Brock Warren Myrol, 29. "We need to get them (grow ops) out of here," MET's Cpl. Daniel Pons told The NOW in December, gesturing to some neighbourhood children playing ball hockey near a busted grow op. "You can't tell me there's not a risk here." Pons also said the team is investigating a number of grow ops on Westwood Plateau, all of which they suspect are related to organized crime. A May 2002 report by University College of the Fraser Valley professor Darryl Plecas states that generally speaking, marijuana growing operations coming to the attention of the police are increasing in number by an average of 36-per-cent per year, increasing in average size at a rate of 40-per-cent per year. Overall, for the period between 1997 and 2000, police seized 1.2 million marijuana plants and 8,646 kilograms of harvested marijuana in B.C. The value of the marijuana seized is estimated at between $462 million and $1.25 billion. The average dollar value per operation, which consisted of 166 live plants and 3.7 kilograms of harvested plants, is estimated to be somewhere between $100,000 and $130,000. This year alone the Coquitlam RCMP detachment reported uncovering 42 grow ops, not including the 28 active and inactive grow ops discovered in a Cape Horn townhouse complex last week. In 2004, the RCMP busted 302 marijuana grow ops in Coquitlam - a 28-per-cent increase over the year before - and 82 in Port Coquitlam, a five-per-cent increase. During its first four months, the MET busted more than 30 grow ops in Coquitlam and Port Coquitlam. These numbers prompted Port Coquitlam city council to forward a resolution to the Federation of Canadian Municipalities to lobby Justice Minister and Attorney General Irwin Cotler to increase the legal consequences of having a grow operation. Attorney General Geoff Plant told The NOW in February that he and Solicitor General Rich Coleman have been working "awfully hard" to try to persuade the federal government to increase the penalties for grow operations in the criminal law. "I think that if we want tougher sentences for grow ops from the courts, we have to change the law and give the courts the tools to impose tougher sentences," Plant said. Public Safety Minister Anne McLellan promised Thursday to take another look at the proposed marijuana decriminalization bill. "Clearly (Justice) Minister Cotler and I will want to take a look at whether we have the right resources being used in the right ways and whether we have the right laws. Have we given the RCMP and other forces the right tools they need to deal with what is an amazing growth, quite truthfully, in these operations." Port Moody-Westwood-Port Coquitlam MP James Moore would say No. "I think the tragedy that we saw in Alberta should be a wake-up call to all public policy makers from city councils right all the way up to the prime minster of Canada that our laws against marijuana grow ops simply aren't working," Moore said. And Moore, who was in Ottawa observing the Liberal policy convention Friday, said the Liberals seem to be going in the wrong direction. He said the deaths were the topic of conversation at the convention, but that he's heard many Liberal MPs using the tragedy as an argument for legalizing marijuana. "Whether drugs are criminalized or decriminalized, the fact is that these are career thugs and if they're not involved in the drug trade they'll be involved in some other aspect of organized crime." Moore said he plans to keep lobbying the Liberals for tougher penalties, a mandatory two-year minimum for being convicted of housing a grow op and more money for the RCMP. "I think people in the Tri-Cities have had enough." Baptista said the issues are big, but there is a more important point. "The big thing is that four people have lost their lives and their families (have) to deal with it. They go out there every day to do their job, trying to help their community be safer and it's pretty harsh and disturbing when things like this happen," she said. "It really hits you right to the core." - --- MAP posted-by: Richard Lake