WHAT'S GROWING IN THE PIG BARN? OH, ABOUT $1OM IN MARIJUANA PLANTS

CAMROSE - The barn had pot instead of pork.

Police charged two men after finding 10,415 marijuana plants in various
stages of growth Thursday in a pig barn near Bittern Lake, says Camrose
RCMP.

RCMP spokesman Cpl. Mo Griffiths put the crop's potential street value at
more than $10 million. That works out to about $1,000 per plant.

Griffiths refused Friday to say how police were tipped off about the grow
operation on Rural Road 223, about four kilometres north of Highway 13.
Police did say there was evidence that power was being diverted past the
property's electricity meter.

A neighbour, who didn't want to be named, said the property is rented to
tenants whom she doesn't know. She had no idea there was a grow operation
there.

She and her husband had thought about renting the pig barn last year for
their bulls, but it wasn't suitable for their use. "It was dirty and full of
junk. There was even an old car in there. But I guess someone found a use
for it," she said.

She doubts the property owner knew what was growing in the barn.

The Green Team was formed in 1998 to deal with the increasing popularity of
hydroponic marijuana operations in Alberta. Last year the team dismantled 64
grow operations, seizing 11,700 plants with a potential street value of
$11.7 million.

George Nicholas Bodnar, 42, of Edmonton, and James Robert Mitchell, 47, of
no fixed address, have been charged with unlawfully producing a controlled
substance, possessing a controlled substance for the purposes of trafficking
and theft of electricity.

They are to appear in Camrose provincial court Wednesday.