RECORD-SIZE DRUG FIELDS FOUND

Up To $5 Million Worth Of Pot Planted On Utility Land Along Dallas-GP
Border

Acting on a tipster's call to Grand Prairie police Friday, federal
agents went looking for 200 to 300 marijuana plants amid dense
thickets along the suburb's border with Dallas.

By Saturday morning, investigators had uncovered 10,451 marijuana
plants worth up to $5 million - the biggest drug crop ever found in
the Dallas-Fort Worth area, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement
Administration.

REX C. CURRY / Special Contributor Federal agents took a break after
pulling up marijuana plants Saturday near Grand Prairie's Reagan
Middle School.

Some of the plants were only 200 yards from Grand Prairie's Ronald W.
Reagan Middle School. Investigators don't know who planted them.

"It's a pretty sophisticated operation," said Jim Capra, special agent
in charge of the DEA's Dallas office. "It's not a one-man job. They
cleared areas, dug irrigation canals and set up a campsite."

The plants - some of them 8 feet tall - were spread across three
separate fields deep inside 5-plus acres of a heavily wooded property
owned by Oncor Electric Delivery.

It was the third marijuana farm found in the Dallas area this month, a
total the DEA called unusual. On July 12, DEA agents found 325 pot
plants a few hundred yards from their office near Spur 482 and
Stemmons Freeway. A day earlier, Richardson police found 1,100
marijuana plants inside a house. Police found marijuana plants near
Grand Prairie's Reagan Middle School.

In the latest find, the most mature marijuana plants had been growing
at least three months, but the operation probably goes back much further.

"We doubt they'd plant this significant a grow the first time," DEA
spokeswoman Terry Wyatt said. "They usually don't start this big. They
probably started with one plot, went undetected, did well and came
back and planted more."

Agent Capra said evidence at the campsite gave investigators some
clues to who was harvesting the plants. He declined to describe the
evidence, but the campsite - hidden under a black tarp - included a
propane tank, sleeping bags, tents, fresh trash and lots of food supplies.

"We got some good leads out there," Agent Capra said. "We're
hopeful."

The fields' sophistication makes it unlikely to be a
mom-and-pop-gone-bad operation, investigators said. The drug
harvesters had connected 1-inch-thick PVC pipes to a creek to keep the
plants watered. Well-hidden

The fields' location and structure made detection difficult. Much of
the land is so dense with vegetation that visitors would need to cut
their own paths. The surrounding area is largely undeveloped.

Whoever planted the fields also knew to avoid cutting out a large
canopy that could be spotted easily from the air. The fields were
spread across 10 plots, and the plants blended in with surrounding
greenery.

"Unless you know what you're looking for, you can walk through
marijuana plants and think they're milkweed," Agent Capra said.

On Saturday, 50 investigators from 10 law enforcement agencies dug up
the plants by hand. Marijuana plants have deep root systems, making
the work difficult.

The property starts at the southwest corner of Belt Line and Camp
Wisdom roads and goes south. There's a subdivision of modern,
two-story brick houses on the south end next to the middle school.

"It never crosses your mind that you got something like that so
close," said Billy Crowder, a postal worker who's lived in the
neighborhood two years. "It's a nice area, but the way the world is
today, nothing surprises me." Unused property

Oncor owns the land as a right of way for a future transmission line,
but with nothing there now, employees have little reason to make visits.

"There's no way we would know what goes on in that specific area,"
Oncor spokeswoman Carol Peters said.

After digging up the plants Saturday, investigators wrapped them
inside blue tarps. Bulldozers cleared the way for all-terrain vehicles
to haul off the tarps, which were then emptied into a U-Haul truck.
The DEA plans to burn the plants except for a few samples it will keep
as evidence.

Agents trucked off about 30 percent of the plants Saturday and expect
to return this morning to finish. Dallas and Grand Prairie police
planned to guard the area overnight.

"There's 10,000 pounds of marijuana that won't hit the streets," Agent
Capra said, "and $4 to $5 million not going into the pockets of some
drug organization."