CAS REMOVES 7 KIDS FROM HOMES IN POT RAIDS

The Children's Aid Society has removed seven children under 11 years
of age from houses where police were looking for marijuana grow operations.

The child protection agency has been seizing one or two children a
month from home marijuana labortatories, where they are exposed to a
variety of health and safety risks, and taking them into custody as
children in need of protection.

To regain custody, the parents would have to go to court and convince
a judge they can take care of them.

The latest child seizures occurred as a result of a series of raids
Thursday evening. Drug officers also harvested 965 plants worth almost
$1 million from four homes, found dismantled grow operations in two
other houses, recovered $27,000 in suspected drug money and charged a
man and two women with the cultivation of marijuana, trafficking and
possession of the proceeds of crime.

Sergeant Carol Pacey said police found the first four children in a
house on Barnesdale Avenue North where they also discovered a
dismantled grow operation and marijuana buds. Because there were no
adults in the house, police called in the CAS (Children's Aid Society)
who seized the children for their own protection.

The CAS followed police to another residence on Sherman Avenue where a
26-year-old mother was arrested and charged in connection with 217
marijuana plants found in her home. There were three children living
in the house who were taken into CAS custody.

Police found another 335 plants in a house on Burlington Street North,
where they charged the homeowners, and 300 plants at a Mud Street duplex.

A 38-year-old mother living on Burlington Street told the CAS and
police she was concerned about the welfare of her two children, who
were left with a babysitter at a known marijuana grow house on St.
Matthews Avenue. She said the children were six months and 14 years
old.

Police said they found a dimantled marijuana grow operation on St.
Matthews Avenue but no children. They were then directed to an address
on Upper Wentworth Street where they found 113 plants. Again, the
children weren't there.

Detective Paul Henderson, of the vice drug squad, said the children
hadn't been located as of yesterday afternoon.

Henderson said all the grow houses were rental units not owned by the
growers. Unlike most home drug laboratories, the growers hadn't
bypassed hydro meter and were paying the full electric bills for their
1,000-watt grow lights.

Asked about the living conditions for the children, he replied: "They
weren't fantastic (at the Sherman Avenue home), not overly bad, except
for the fact there was marijuana growing in the house." He added the
Barnesdale Avenue house was "squalid".

Henderson said children living in a marijuana grow house are exposed
to health and safety risks. Because of the large amount of power drawn
by the grow lights, there is a danger of circuits overloading and
causing fire. When the hydro meter has been bypassed, there is also a
danger of electrocution.

In home laboratories, children are exposed to toxic chemicals used to
grow the plants and poor air quality when the house isn't properly
vented.

Henderson said there is also a potential for violence because rival
dealers might suddenly barge in to steal the marijuana, instead of
incurring the cost of growing it themselves.