POT HOUSES LINKED TO ASIAN MOB

Over 70 Indoor Marijuana Crops Discovered In Manitoba This
Year

City police and RCMP believe the province's explosive jump in
large-scale hydroponic marijuana grow operations is connected to an
Asian-based organized crime network that extends across the country
and around the world.

More than 70 large indoor grow operations have been found in Manitoba
this year, a sign the group appears to be well organized in buying and
financing newer residential homes and quickly converting them into
clandestine grow houses.

There are also indications some of the low-level suspects arrested at
several of these grow houses were recruited in Western Europe and came
to Winnipeg solely to grow pot.

Winnipeg Police Chief Jack Ewatski said the rise in grow houses
allegedly backed by Asian crime is putting a strain on police
resources, as they now have to catch up to identify ringleaders and
how entrenched they are in Winnipeg and other Canadian cities.

The RCMP, a recently formed city police Asian organized crime unit and
Immigration Canada officials are trying to piece together how the
group is interconnected and how some arrived in Canada.

The cases in Winnipeg and other major Canadian cities also raise
questions about Canada's efforts to tighten immigration controls since
the terrorist attacks in the United States on Sept. 11, 2001. To date,
more than a dozen people -- all claim to have a Vietnamese background
- -- have been arrested by RCMP and city police in connection with the
spread of these sophisticated marijuana grow operations.

Nam Vu, spokesman for the city's Vietnamese community -- about 7,000
people -- stressed the alleged behaviour of a few is not
representative of the entire community.

He also said the suspects do not have any contact with the local
community.

Police have said they want to prosecute the accused on charges of
involvement in a criminal enterprise, but to do that, the Crown must
demonstrate how each is related to the other.

The same charge was being used to prosecute five alleged Hells Angels
associates in Winnipeg.

Police have said that taken together, the marijuana they have seized
is worth millions on the street. They also believe it is being grown
not for local consumers, but to be smuggled into the northern United
States. The sheer amount of pot being seized -- RCMP uprooted 3,000
plants at four grow houses discovered in St. Andrews June 18-20 --
suggests that a criminal network is at work packaging and distributing
it.

The investigation is still in its infancy, but this much is known so
far, according to sources:

* The majority of the accused are Canadian citizens.

* At least four of the accused charged since Jan. 1 had arrived in
Winnipeg from Western Europe within the past six months; three had
Dutch passports and one had a German passport.

* Each of the four had secured foreign citizenship after claiming
refugee status in those countries.

* None of these people was documented in Immigration Canada's
database, meaning they were allowed to clear Canada Customs on
six-month visitor's visas without any follow-up by authorities until
they were arrested by city police.

* Two of those arrested for growing marijuana have similar charges
against them for allegedly doing the same thing in another Canadian
province.

* One of the 11 accused is now alleged to have overstayed a six-month
visitor's visa, but no immigration proceedings have taken place yet
because the criminal charge must be dealt with first in court.

* Two of those charged were caught by police March 22 as they drove
out of the city. They are alleged to have been behind two of the grow
operations in Winnipeg and were found in a car packed with personal
possessions and $18,000 Cdn in cash and about $1,000 US. One of them
also faces a charge of marijuana cultivation in Hamilton, Ont. None of
the 11 people have had their charges -- cultivation of marijuana and
possession for the purpose of trafficking -- dealt with in court. All
have been released from pretrial custody.

Federal Crown attorney Ian Mann said prosecutors have a list of
questions they want police to answer besides the citizenship and
immigration status of each suspect.

Mann said he wants to know who owns the houses where the grow
operations were found, whether the same real estate agent is involved
and how the purchase of each home was financed.

"How can you get a mortgage if you have no income?" Mann asked.

Mann, who prosecutes drug cases, said he also wants to know whether
the homes were bought with cash and if the same person is responsible
for illegally wiring the indoor grow operation, typically located in
an unfinished basement.

The Canada Revenue Agency is also looking at the Winnipeg cases.
Officials are also examining how the homes used to grow the marijuana
were purchased and whether taxes were evaded.

Sources say the purpose of delving into the backgrounds of the accused
and their relationship to one another is to find out whether they are
connected to an established crime group.

Police have little information right now, other than the suspects'
ethnic background, to show they are involved in a criminal enterprise.

Many have claimed they cannot speak English and, when a translator is
supplied, have not furnished police with any information. The Criminal
Intelligence Service Canada (CISC), in its 2003 annual report, defined
Asian-based organized crime in Canada as loosely knit networks of
individuals who are highly mobile, entrepreneurial, culturally and
linguistically diverse, and with numerous criminal associates
nationally and internationally, particularly in the United States and
Southeast Asia.

Those arrested in grow houses are believed to be recruited in exchange
for being helped to enter Canada. They are considered the bottom rung
of the ladder and do not know much, if anything, about who is
distributing the drugs and profiting from it.

CISC also says these criminal groups will remain active in Canada in
large-scale marijuana cultivation in order to take advantage of the
high profits, low risk and relatively lenient sentences.

Mann said the accused in Manitoba do not have any known criminal
background. Police have said in the past that typically, first-time
offenders charged with growing marijuana get conditional sentences --
not jail time.