VAN LATEST NRP TOOL AGAINST DRUG TRADE

The big white van isn't something you'd want to see parked in your
neighbour's driveway.

At least double the length of a typical family minivan and tall enough
to stand in, this one comes with large magnetic signs that can easily
be stuck on the door panels.

There's no mistaking the message conveyed by the big black lettering
on the signs.

Marihuana (sic) Grow-Op Raid. Police Raid in Progress.

The magnets, which would cover about half a normal fridge, aim to turn
heads at houses across Niagara where the owners shy away from the
limelight and hope to blend in - at least from the view on the street.

"From the outside, the grow-ops look like a regular house. They don't
modify the exterior - they want to keep it that way, to keep it
hidden. It's inside where they modify it," said Niagara Regional
Police Det. Const. Lou Greco, who was a member of the service's guns,
gangs and grows unit from its inception three years ago until last
month when he was reassigned to Niagara Falls.

The big white van with the billboard-like magnets is the latest tool
in the unit's arsenal as police try to uproot green-thumbed drug
dealers who put millions of dollars worth of hydroponic pot on the
streets of Niagara every year.

The NRP was able to buy the vehicle - known by officers as a
"take-down van" - last fall with a grant of $84,735 provided by the
Ontario Ministry of the Attorney General. The money came from a
special provincial fund generated by the sale of property seized from
criminals by police departments.

The van allows the five-member unit to store all of its gear, from
fire-retardent suits and air-purifying masks to bolt cutters and
battering rams, on board so it's in place for raids.

"Before we used to have to lug all of this equipment in our own
vehicles," Greco said earlier this week while giving a tour of the
van.

"It's much safer this way. Everything stays here. We're not
contaminating our cars."

Members of the unit can also travel to suspected grow-ops together and
maintain their cover instead of arriving in private vehicles as they
used to do previously.

The van also serves as a mobile office during drug raids, allowing
investigators to begin processing evidence from grow-ops.

If 2010 plays out as the previous three years have, Greco expects the
take-down van to be in regular use.

On average, the guns, gangs and grows unit carries out up to 100
investigations and makes as many as 65 busts annually.

Since 2007, the unit has seized more than 55,000 marijuana plants with
an estimated street value of more than $55 million.

In most cases, the grow-ops have a combination of plants in various
growth stages, from seedlings to mature plants with buds ready to by
harvested and sold.

"It can be anything from two or three plants to 1,000," Greco
said.

"Sometimes one house will lead us to two or three others."

Greco estimated that in about half the cases, the crooks running the
grow-ops have also tapped into hydro illegally, which poses serious
dangers to the public,

While the amount of pot seized by police may vary each year,
investigators warn that doesn't necessarily indicate the grow-op
industry is expanding or shrinking.

An increase in any given year could only be a reflection of an
increase in the number of investigations and raids carried out by police.