VPD OPPOSES SENATE MOVE TO SOFTEN PENALTY ON GROW OPS

Proposal Would Remove Minimum Sentence For Less Than 200
Plants

A Senate amendment that would soften a bill designed to impose
mandatory sentences on people illegally growing marijuana will likely
result in the proliferation of smaller growing operations, says the
head of the Vancouver police department's anti-gang and drug section.

Insp. Brad Desmarais said the department opposes an amendment of Bill
C-15 by the Senate's committee on legal and constitutional affairs
that removed the section imposing a minimum sentence of nine months on
anyone found guilty of growing fewer than 200 plants.

"The proposed legislation was designed to make it tougher for
marijuana grow operators by imposing a minimum sentence for anyone
convicted of running grow-ops of 200 plants or fewer. The Senate has
amended the bill to remove this provisionand the VPD can't support
that," said Desmarais.

Desmarais said the department still has a chance of petitioning
against the amendment as the bill has yet to reach third reading.

He said the motive behind all illegal marijuana growing operations is
profit.

"If they remove the minimum sentencing for grow ops under 200 plants
then they will, withoutadoubt, createahuge industry where we will
seeaproliferation of grows with 199 plants because there will be less
penalty," he said. "Criminals constantly operate on a cost/benefit
analysis - 199 plants will still constituteaviable commercial option.
I suspect if this amendment passes we will see even more manifestly
unsafe grows occurring.

"It doesn't matter if there is a wiring malfunction in a 200plant grow
or in a 2,000-plant grow - houses still burn down, people could die
and property will be destroyed. The only difference is there will be
more [albeit smaller] grows.

"There should be public safety issues addressed - grows and labs in
houses where children are present should also attract a minimum
sentence, regardless of size," said Desmarais.

The committee altered the controversial bill last Thursday, allowing a
judge discretion when sentencing offenders convicted of growing fewer
than 200 plants, something Justice Minister Rob Nicholson wanted to
prevent.

Other provisions of the bill that would allow automatic sentences for
a variety of drug-related convictions remained intact.

Desmarais said the creation of smaller but more numerous growing
operations will be an administrative and enforcement headache for
police as it already requires many hours of work to produce the
evidence sufficient for a search warrant.

"This will only further deplete our already overtaxed, resourcestarved
department. If we have to prove someone has a 1,000 grow operation
broken down into five separate units it will be a huge undertaking,"
he said.

Desmarais said the Senate seemed to be thinking that the under-200
growing operation was just a "momand pop operation" but an examination
of the profits from such an enterprise shows it to be anything but.

"If someone was to run a 33plant operation for a year - so 99 plants-
that would generate $178,000 tax-free dollars and that would be
wholesale value. So it's not mom and pop," he said.