CANNABIS FACTORY YIELDS ONE OF THE BIGGEST-EVER HAULS

A PROFESSIONAL gambler who staked his winnings on one of the UK's
biggest cannabis factories was jailed with his two partners in crime
for a total of 17 years on Friday.

The trio had conspired to produce cannabis at a secret #1.3 million
drugs farm hidden behind a thatched cottage in Finchamp-stead.

Gerard Murphy of Reading Road, Finchampstead, Keith Alexander and Ian
Rollison were busted during a dawn raid when more than 100 officers
swooped on the state-of-the-art factory on April 28.

It was capable of hydroponically growing 1.3 million pounds worth of
the illegal drug a year.

Jailing the three men, Judge Stanley Spence said: "This was a massive
cultivation of cannabis enterprise which was controlled by you, Murphy.

"Even though cannabis has been reclassified to C from B it is still a
prohibited drug.

"The police search took four days, which gives us an indication of the
massive scale."

Murphy, aged 35, who had invested 20,000 pounds of horse gambling
winnings into the enterprise, was jailed for seven and a half years.

Judge Spence told the defendant, who was convicted by a jury on
October 22: "You are the only known provider of money for the
preparation of growing sheds and provision of items required for them.

"I do not accept that you are the only provider of funds. I am content
there must have been others."

Jailing scaffolder Rollison, aged 41, for five years, Judge Spence
told him: "You are described as the caretaker of the site. You must
have known what was going on."

Jailing bricklayer Alexander, aged 42, for four and a half years, he
added: "Your role is the most minimal and involved general help in
setting up and construction.

"You must have known what was going on."

Following Murphy's conviction, Detective Constable Steven Jones said
the cannabis factory was the biggest-ever seized in the Thames Valley
and possibly the largest in the UK.

Thames Valley Police drug valuation expert Paul Norley told the jury
it was the largest cannabis factory he had seen in his 20-year career.

Giving evidence from the witness box, Murphy said he had been
house-sitting the thatched cottage for owner Kevin Cox, the European
director for phone giant Nokia, at the time.

He initially claimed he had thought the cannabis was a plant called
khat - a leaf chewed by Ethiopians to produce an amphetamine effect.

Murphy, of Reading Road, Finchampstead, denied one charge of
conspiring to produce cannabis between January 28 and April 29 this
year.

Rollison, of Station Approach, West Byfleet, Surrey and Alexander, of
Downside Road, Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire, admitted the charge.