GARDEN STORE AND THE POT POLICE

Narc Squad Keeps Eye On Grow-Light Buyers, And That Riles Owner

BELLEVUE -- If you met Bob Cronk, you'd probably think the mild-mannered,
soft-spoken man with deep blue eyes and a passion for all things
horticultural was an accountant.

You'd be right.

You might see him as the kind of guy who runs for City Council.

Right again. Cronk ran last November, but got only 40 percent of the vote.
That makes him accustomed to a certain level of public scrutiny.

But Cronk runs a garden supply business that has been a target of another
kind of scrutiny -- police surveillance.

Cronk's Green Gardens store has become a magnet for the Eastside Narcotics
Task Force, which has made cases leading to more than 100 convictions for
marijuana-related offenses just by watching Cronk's store and investigating
his customers, according to an affidavit from one recent case.

The task force is a joint effort by the Bellevue, Kirkland, Redmond and
Mercer Island police and sometimes includes a federal Drug Enforcement
Agency representative. Last year it seized more than $3.5 million in drugs
and $1.3 million in assets, and in the past two years has had a 100 percent
conviction rate in cases involving search warrant execution, said Marcia
Harden, a Bellevue police spokeswoman.

The task force declined to say how many people have been followed from
Cronk's store, but Harden said detectives aren't camping out in the parking
lot.

"They're too busy just to sit there and follow people around," she said.

"They (Green Gardens) specialize in hydroponics and that's somewhat
difficult to find. . . . It just makes the detectives' jobs easier to have a
place like that, that supplies equipment where there's a decent chance
they're using it to do something illegal."

Brian Daggett, a Bellevue police officer and task force member, declined to
be interviewed in detail for this story, but said, "There are other stores
that sell indoor grow equipment, but I'm not sure how dirty the customers
are."

But Cronk, 45, said he feels harassed by officers who have been watching his
business.

It is news to Cronk that his store -- a small, plain shop in an industrial
strip mall on Bel-Red Road -- may have a reputation as a popular place for
pot cultivators.

Cronk said he doesn't cultivate marijuana or associate with those who do.

About once a year someone inquires at the shop about growing cannabis and is
promptly asked to leave, he said.

"I don't know anything about the drug culture," he said. "We want to be
known as a place that has some of the best and most innovative products for
gardening. We don't want to be known as the place for dope growing."

He estimates his shop sees 500 to 1,000 customers every month, but he sells
mostly wholesale to retailers.

"People shopping here shouldn't have to worry about having their door broken
down. People shouldn't be suspects for buying garden supplies here," Cronk
said. "It's nobody's damn business what you buy here, anymore than what you
walk out of the drugstore with."

He says he doesn't know what he can do about it, but he wonders why the task
force is focusing on his store when there are several within a half-mile
radius that stock similar wares.

Harden acknowledges that other nearby stores sell the same items, but Green
Gardens concentrates on hydroponics.

"For us the advantage is that's all they sell," she said.

Wearing a crisply pressed white shirt, black jeans and bright, scuff-free
white tennis shoes, Cronk's voice takes on a reverent, ministerial tone when
he extols the virtues of hydroponic, or dirt-free, growing.

Hydroponic gardening is faster, more efficient and produces better flavors
in produce, Cronk said. He knows that some of the same equipment --
high-watt lights, odor-cleansing ozonators and metal light hoods to direct
heat downward, among other items -- are also commonly used to grow
marijuana.

But they're all legal products with legitimate purposes, he and others say.
And they want to know why Green Gardens is under the microscope.

"He's in their neighborhood, so it's easy for them," said Jeff Steinborn, a
local lawyer who largely represents clients who face marijuana charges.
"That is the only store I have seen busts come out of."

Attorney Bob Leen once represented a client who was nabbed after being
followed from Green Gardens.

"The police are engaging in something that I'd call targeting," Leen said.
"The police have no prior suspicion of them (the customers). They're saying
that the fact that people go to this store is enough to justify checking
them out."

Sheila Weirth, a King County deputy prosecuting attorney assigned to the
task force full-time, said following people home is a common tactic.

"(Police) don't have to have probable cause to start following anyone. What
you do is exposed to the public -- the police can watch that," she said.

Detectives then develop further evidence of marijuana growing by checking
near the residence for the strong, distinct odor of the plant and finding
out if electric bills are much higher than average -- an indication that
high-watt grow lights are in use.

"You could be growing tomatoes or orchids with these, but we've never found
that," Weirth said.

But people like Judy LaPlante say police aren't always right.

LaPlante, a regular Green Gardens customer who lives just outside of
Bellevue, said she recently saw a King County Sheriff's car cruising back
and forth in front of her house. The avid gardener suspects the officer was
interested in the 1,000-watt bulb in her greenhouse, where she raises
flowers and keeps a turtle tank warm.

"I like to build things. If I go out to Eagle Hardware, is somebody going to
follow me and see if I have legal permits to build something?" LaPlante
said. "Where do you draw the line?"

Cronk wonders the same thing.

"If we outlaw anything with a possible illegal use, then we'd have to outlaw
everything," he said. "This is like trying to stop poaching by controlling
the sale of fishing supplies."