POLICE MAKE TWO BIG POT SEIZURES

Semi-Trailer Busted at West Hawk Lake, Home Operation Found in South
St. B

TWO more big marijuana seizures were made by police in Manitoba
yesterday night -- one from a semi-trailer at West Hawk Lake and the
other from a home grow operation in Winnipeg.

Police released few details about either case yesterday as both are
still under investigation.

Both seizures also continue a trend being seen across the country over
the past year -- the movement of marijuana from British Columbia to
eastern Canada and the alleged involvement of Asian-based crime groups.

The first seizure was made at the West Hawk Lake truck weigh scale at
the Manitoba-Ontario boundary on the Trans-Canada Highway.

RCMP say they seized 155 kilos of packaged marijuana from an eastbound
semi-trailer after a routine check by provincial inspectors. Two men
from Quebec are facing charges.

The other seizure was in the Island Lakes subdivision in south St.
Boniface. Police, armed with a warrant, raided a hydroponic marijuana
grow operation at a home on Gull Wing Bay. Police found 610 marijuana
plants with a street value of about $1 million. Hydro had been
bypassed to avoid detection. Two people are in custody.

The grow operation is the third one uncovered by police in the Island
Lakes area in the last year.

The seizure is also the latest that police believe is linked to
Asian-based organized crime. Members of these groups prefer to buy or
rent homes in quiet residential areas which they turn into lucrative
grow operations.

Often, the grow trays and artificial lighting is set up in spacious,
unfinished insulated basements. The lighting and watering systems are
powered by stolen electricity -- it's wired directly from the hydro
line so it bypasses the hydro meter.

Typically, the people tending these grow operations are young or
middle-aged couples.