MARIJUANA CULTIVATION ON RISE IN ONTARIO, FANTINO SAYS

Illegal marijuana cultivation has reached epidemic proportions in
Ontario and justice officials in the United States have branded their
northern neighbour a "source country," the province's top police
official said Wednesday.

Marijuana is exported south and traded for crystal meth and crack
cocaine which are then brought back into Canada, provincial police
Commissioner Julian Fantino said Wednesday.

"The going terminology is 'brown south, white north,"' Fantino said,
adding marijuana is also being exchanged for guns.

"It's a black eye on Canada when you have the United States... refer
to us as a source country of marijuana."

Investigating and shutting down marijuana grow-ops make up 60 per
cent of the workload of the force's drug enforcement unit, said OPP
Insp. Brian Martin.

Cracking down on those operations should help drive down the import
of crystal meth and crack cocaine, he said.

"You have to stop the problem at one end and hopefully that product's
not coming back in."

Provincial police announced it seized and destroyed more than 118,000
marijuana plants from 220 grow operations, charging 56 people during
its annual eight-week marijuana eradication program - up from 10,000
plants from last year.

Over the last five years the force has investigated nearly 2,800
grow-ops. They've also seized more than 2,700 weapons.

An increasing number of suppliers are moving from indoor to outdoor
grow-ops, which can produce more plants, police said.

The OPP found one outdoor operation producing 40,000 plants.

There is also an "alarming increase" in the use of loaded weapons,
animal traps, armed guards and even illegal immigrants by growers to
ward off so-called "pot pirates" and police, they said.

Organized crime is a huge operation with tentacles that reach
internationally and its involvement in grow-ops is increasing, said Fantino.

"Organized crime will use whoever and will do whatever (to) achieve
their goals and objectives, which is to make these obscene profits illegally."

The "drug subculture" was responsible for what Fantino called an
epidemic of very serious crimes, such as robberies, several years ago
in Orillia, Ont.

"(Marijuana) is the precursor, if you will, to so much of the
violence and other activities... that end up victimizing the most
vulnerable communities," he said.

"You know full well what the consequences of what crack does to a
neighbourhood, the vulnerability of some of these people in these
neighbourhoods, the violence associated with it."

The fight against drugs just isn't about "smoking a little joint here
and there."

"It's about the bigger picture... It's a public safety threat, it's
an officer safety threat," he said.

Canada is too soft on drug-related criminals, Fantino added.

"Those (criminals) working cross-border, we'd love for them to get
indicted into the United States because that's where they're really
going to get the business."

While Fantino conceded police are fighting an uphill battle against
the grow-ops, and that the battle will never be won, he added things
would be much worse if police weren't combating drugs.