POLICE CHIEF WON'T GIVE UP

'We'll Keep Going After Organized Crime'

Calgary police won't let up on their quest to crush thriving marijuana
grow operations or their pursuit to jail profiteering organized
criminals at their helm, vows Chief Jack Beaton.

"I've seen the operations that have run. I've seen the intelligence.
Believe me, organized crime figures have their fingers in all kinds of
drugs in our community . . . That's how they finance their smuggling,
prostitution, trafficking -- all that stuff," said Beaton.

"Organized crime has so much to do with grow operations that I always
say they are No. 1 for us because that's where they get a lot of their
financing . . . It's big bucks for them." he said.

Criminal Intelligence Service Alberta reports 24 organized crime
groups operate in the province.

It's just a matter of time before police chisel through the many
layers of low-end criminals -- including "street gangs who distribute
drugs for them" to get to the players at the top, said Beaton.

"I know they think they lay protected behind this great wall of
silence, but no, no.

We get 'em.

"We get them, not as fast as we'd like to, but we keep going after
organized crime and put them in jail. And we'll continue to do that,"
said Beaton determinedly.

Beaton said police owe this to the community it serves.

"I've seen, as a police officer over my 30-plus years of policing, the
harm drugs do to our community. It doesn't matter whether it's
marijuana or meth or cocaine or whatever it is, it hurts our
community, it hurts our society and it hurts our kids," said Beaton.

However, a self-professed taxpaying, hard-working, ex-dealer says a
"negative spin" is being put on the marijuana scene in Calgary.

"It's not a devil drug. Cannabis saved my life," said Ben Carter, 29,
who is authorized to use marijuana to combat depression.

"I don't sell. I used to sell. None of my dealers had any connection
to organized crime. There is no danger next door," said Carter.

"A lot of my associates had 300 plants. I've seen rooms with 1,000.
Yes, people do rent houses for pot factories and put a TV in the
living room and put in light timers to make it look like someone lives
there," he said.

This year, Calgary police have seized almost $19 million worth of
plants from a number of grow ops flourishing in fortified,
booby-trapped houses in Calgary neighborhoods. That compares with $54
million last year.

"Some pot factories are supporting organized crime. But the majority
of grow ops in the city are operated by people in their late 30s to
50s. A lot of it is done by average people to subsidize their income.
They smoke and make money on the side," said Carter.

They also hurt their children by rearing them in homes riddled with
chemicals and toxic mould, said Beaton.

"One thing we're starting to see more of in our community is children
are in fact living in the home where a grow is taking place. . . it's
a dangerous, dangerous situation.

"Our kids going to school who have been raised in a grow operation are
sick kids. Their parents don't care. They're usually addicted to drugs
and usually have a vested interest in the residual profits," he said.

Beaton cited the safety factor, comparing like chemicals exhausted out
through chimneys or water vents to "radiation falling down on yards in
the near vicinity to you."

He points to the dangers of shoddy jobs done on bypassing
electricity.

"I'm amazed we don't find more people from the criminal element
electrocuted," he said.

Beaton also condemns the violence. "They're raiding each others
gardens. . . and they're killing each other. It's a violent industry."

The specialized police Green Team could only get to 35 per cent of the
415 tips on grow ops in the city last year.

"Can you imagine how many grow ops we actually have going on in our
city?" said Beaton.

"Some people in our society need to stand up and be counted, as those
people are hurting our community."

A pound of Calgary pot -- comparable to the coveted, potent B.C. Bud--
sells for about $2,000 locally and as much as $15,000 US in the United
States.

Marijuana cultivation has exploded in Calgary, and in fact,
nationally, largely because users in U.S. rely heavily on Canadian
home-grown.

"Let me tell you why they grow it in Canada and ship it to the United
States. . . . If you are in a marijuana grow industry down there,
you're going to jail. In some places, and I'll use Florida, for seven
years minimum.

"They don't grow it down there. . . . If they get caught they
automatically get a fairly severe penalty," said Beaton.

"In Canada, there is no penalty. In the last 10 grow operations in
Calgary that I researched, nobody went to jail except one individual
who asked to go to jail so he could get deported."

In a Feb. 24 letter to Prime Minister Paul Martin police groups
expressed concern about a federal plan to decriminalize marijuana.

"The loosening of marijuana possession laws will come at a high price
to our society," said the letter.

It said decriminalizing possession laws without putting measures in
place to enforce drug laws is making marijuana more available,
primarily to young users. They urged Martin to delay Bill C-10 until
there is a comprehensive National Drug Strategy.

But a spokeswoman for the Krieger Foundation, which crusades for
marijuana use for the sick and dying, points an accusing finger at the
feds for a different reason.

"The government put the crime element into it," said Marie Krieger.
"Black market prices keep the price so high. There wouldn't be an
organized crime angle if prohibition weren't in effect -- a
decriminalization of the plant is what I'm talking about."