POLICE SEIZE $914,000 IN POT FROM GLANWORTH-AREA HOME

Days after Canada's largest pot bust, police have seized nearly $1
million in marijuana plants in a raid on a London home on a quiet,
rural street near Glanworth. City and RCMP officers swooped down on
6643 Fisher Lane Tuesday afternoon and found 914 pot plants inside.

A Kitchener man was arrested at the scene.

Police also searched an apartment building at 951 Wonderland Rd. S.,
seizing documentary evidence and charging a London man, said Const.
Paul Martin.

With only three homes on Fisher Lane, neighbours are isolated, said
Donna Merriam, who lives on the street.

She said she thought an older couple from the U.S. had bought but not
yet moved into the home where the grow operation was busted.

"It had been empty for some time," she said, surprised to hear there
was a grow operation next door.

"It's not something you think about. It's not something that even
occurs to you."

Police began investigating the house in September, Martin
said.

The drugs police seized have an estimated street value of
$914,000.

Police said the home had a device that bypassed the electricity
meter.

Grow operations require large amounts of power, so operators often try
to tap unnoticed into power supplies.

The operation was larger than police typically see, Martin
said.

"It's definitely on the high end of the scale, normally the average
yield would be between $300,000 and $400,000," he said.

"When we look at the whole progress of operations, maybe $90,000 would
be an average and certainly that has crept up over the last five years."

Martin said operations have become more elaborate.

At one time, grow operations would only use part of a house for
marijuana production. But now, it's not uncommon for police to find
whole houses converted into sophisticated operations.

The Fisher Lane home had been converted into a commercial operation,
Martin said.

Barrie police uncovered Canada's largest known grow operation last
Friday, seizing 30,000 pot plants from a former Molson brewery.

The sophisticated operation generated an estimated $100 million a year
and went undetected for more than a year.

Police charged nine people, including a Corunna man, in the Barrie
raid.