WARRANT RIPPED IN POT-POOL CASE

A man who police say had a swimming pool full of dope argued yesterday that
an illegal search warrant violated his rights.

James Scott MacGillivray, 49, was charged with cultivation and possession
of marijuana after city detectives raided his acreage near Sherwood Park on
June 2, 1998. More than 250 pot plants were seized from the bungalow,
mostly from an indoor swimming pool that had been drained of water, cops
testified in Edmonton's Court of Queen's Bench.

Drug squad Det. Clayton Sach told the court that a tipster called April 9
to say that a long-haired man resembling a biker had an indoor pool full of
pot. Sach said he then did a motor-vehicle check on the suspect's name and
phoned TransAlta to discover how much power was being consumed at the
acreage. He got the warrant June 2.

Defence lawyer Brian Peterson told Justice Peter McIntyre the information
Sach gave a judge to get the warrant was unreliable. Peterson charged that
the tipster was unidentified, there was no time frame given on when the pot
was being allegedly grown and Sach combined facts he got from the records
searches with what he attributed to the tipster.

The Crown is expected to defend the warrant when the trial continues today.