IT'S BIG BUSINESS FOR GANGS

VIETNAMESE AND Chinese ethnic gangs and Hells Angels bikers are the
main players in an explosion of Canadian hydroponic weed growing,
police and experts say. And there is evidence the gangs are in cahoots.

York Regional Police Chief Armand La Barge said police intelligence
services have established that sophisticated gangs smuggle marijuana
across the United States border and return to Canada with heroin,
cocaine and cash.

Enough for Everyone

La Barge said the rival gangs will "actually rely on each other for
the distribution and shipment ... like big business."

La Barge said turf wars are few, as the "millions and millions" being
made are enough for everyone.

The Organized Crime Agency of British Columbia (OCABC) estimates that
organized crime currently controls 85% of grow houses and distribution
in B.C.

A University College of the Fraser Valley study suggests Vietnamese
ethnic gangs now have close to 100% control in B.C.

Asian gangs have ended the monopoly that Hells Angels and the Italian
mob once had on the drug trade, says the 2001 United States- Canada
Border Drug Threat Assessment.

The Green Tide report, commissioned by the Ontario Association of
Chiefs of Police (OACP), said mob control of Ontario is believed to be
high, but it "is not firmly established" and needs to be better
understood and better investigated.

But the report also cited OPP sources saying that in the first few
months of last year, one well-armed gang "systematically shipped over
385 kg of marijuana by rail from B.C. to Ont."

Toronto Police drug squad head Staff-Insp. Dan Hayes said: "Everybody
is getting into the game in some fashion or another, at the growing
stage.

"Asian-based crime already have their own distribution networks and
pipelines."

Hayes said the Asian mob bosses prey upon cash-strapped immigrants and
pay them to grow, water, feed and harvest the weed.

Toronto Police sergeants Jim Gibson and Gary McQueen, street bosses of
the major crime unit in 42 Division, which accounts for almost half of
the city's grow-house busts, say the labs they find usually have
similar plans and the suspects they catch appear to have "been
coached" to keep their mouths shut.

"A lot of the ops are so complex there has to have been an
apprenticeship," Gibson said.

Peel Regional Police morality squad Insp. Steve Asanin said the
biggest labs in Mississauga and Brampton have been run by Vietnamese
and Chinese gangs.

Halton Police spokesman Sgt. Jeff Corey said it is obvious that the
marijuana trade has "more far-reaching ramifications ... than any of
us know."

Criminology Prof. Darryl Plecas, of University College of the Fraser
Valley, said the notion that weed growing is the only crime being
committed by these groups is "ridiculous."

"It always boggles my mind ... people think these are out-of-work
people making a few bucks on the side. Where the hell do you make
connections to unload 500 pounds of marijuana."

Plecas said the gangs are into far more than just weed
growing.

"I am to have this grow operation," he said sarcastically, "but every
other aspect of my life is going to be honest. I am going to pay my
taxes, buy my gas. You can count on me. I will be an upstanding citizen."

Right.

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POSSESSION PENALTIES

How federal marijuana trafficking penalties in the United States differ
from those in Canada:

UNITED STATES

Federal minimum, mandatory sentence laws for non-violent, first-time
offenders:

100 plants, or 100 kg: 5 years without parole

1,000 plants, or 1,000 kg: 10 years without parole

CANADA

There are no minimum, mandatory laws in Canada -- either currently or
in the new bill C-38 proposed by the Liberal government. There are
maximum terms, but they are seldom ordered. Instead, "judge-made"
minimums are based on previous cases.

a) Currently:

Offenders punishable by up to seven years imprisonment, but the mean
prison term is seven months.

b) Proposed:

Critics of bill C-38 say the proposed new laws have no teeth because
they still have no minimums forcing judges to order long prison terms.
The proposed sentences:

1 to 3 plants: Up to $5,000 fine and up to 12 months

4 to 25 plants: Up to $25,000 fine and/or up to 18 months or, if
pursued by indictment, five years less a day imprisonment

26 to 50 plants: Up to 10 years

More than 50 plants: Up to 14 years