POLICE ACCUSED IN GROW-OP

Realtor, 3 Jail Guards Also Face Charges

Two Toronto police officers enlisted the help of a real estate agent
to buy and sell properties they converted to marijuana grow
operations in order to fuel a massive "criminal enterprise," police
said yesterday.

Constables Patrick Lee and Kevin Bourne are two of 20 people charged
in connection with a large-scale operation to produce and distribute
drugs and launder the proceeds. A realtor, three correctional
officers and 14 civilians will appear with the officers in a
Newmarket court this morning to face myriad charges, including
conspiracy to produce marijuana and participating in a criminal organization.

While not the only corruption scandal to rock the service in recent
years, this incident is the first to link members of the Toronto
police with marijuana grow-ops.

"It's a huge disappointment to us as a group," Police Chief Bill
Blair said yesterday.

"It is more than a betrayal of office. It is, frankly, a betrayal of
all the hard-working and decent men and women of the Toronto Police
Service and the policing profession in this country."

The two officers will be suspended from their duties with full pay if
they are released from custody, Blair said. They are scheduled to
appear in a Newmarket court this morning.

Blair, who said he has asked for the rule concerning their pay status
to be changed, expects that they will be released on bail.

"They'll get full salary until we can deal with employment status," he said.

"That only comes at the end of criminal prosecution."

Both constables are in their 30s, live in York Region and have each
spent much of their service in two of Toronto's most violent
communities - areas that police have recently equipped with 32
additional officers for the summer.

Lee began his career eight years ago at 31 Division, which includes
the Jane and Finch community. He has been on stress leave for much of
the last year, and has been working at the North Collision Reporting
Centre as an intake worker.

"I wanted to be able to represent ... both my culture and Canadian
citizens and help protecting them and serving them," Lee told Citytv
in July 2000, when he graduated to become a member of the force.

Bourne has spent the last nine years at 51 Division, which includes
Regent Park. He received a teamwork commendation from the service last May.

Three houses, five vehicles, $60,000 in cash, nearly 8 kilograms of
marijuana and other drugs, such as ecstasy, and production equipment,
were seized early yesterday when officers executed 63 search warrants
on businesses, homes, and several cars.

Officers took 23 people into custody around 6 a.m., but charged only
20 people - 19 adults and one youth - with various offences.

Lee is charged with participating in a criminal organization,
obstructing justice, laundering the proceeds of crime, producing
marijuana, conspiracy to produce marijuana, possession of a
controlled substance, conspiracy to traffic and possession for the
purpose of trafficking.

Bourne is charged with participating in a criminal organization,
breach of trust, conspiracy to produce marijuana, possession of
marijuana to export and possession of drugs.

A majority of the grow-ops were housed in York Region, police said,
although several police services and squads, including Peel Regional
Police, the OPP and Toronto Police's Guns and Gangs Task Force and
the drug squad, were involved in the investigation.

Some of the drugs produced by the massive operation were sent south
to the United States, police said, but the majority were distributed locally.

Calling the investigation lengthy and complex, police said it began
in February 2007 when York Regional Police uncovered several grow-ops
and linked one of them to Lee.

Since then, Blair said yesterday, an exhaustive search by the
Professional Standards Investigative Support Unit concluded Bourne
was connected to the operation as well.

While guarded with details yesterday, police said their investigation
included hours of surveillance, witness interviews, document
examination and "part 6" techniques, which require judicial authorization.

Those tools include the ability to intercept communications, such as
wiretapping.

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BY THE NUMBERS

POLICE SEIZED

3 houses

5 vehicles

$60,000 in cash

8 kgs of marijuana (approx.)

THOSE CHARGED

20 people in total

1 realtor

2 police officers

3 correctional officers

14 civilians