COPS MAKE HISTORY --BUST RECORD GROW OP

The smell of money -- more than $4 million -- is overpowering.

It clings to clothes and skin in the hot, humid air in the basement of an
old drapery shop. It makes your eyes water.

Ironically, it was the smell of more than 4,000 marijuana plants worth
millions and the chemicals needed to grow them that led Hamilton police
vice and drugs squad officers to the largest single indoor pot farm in
Hamilton's history.

Deep in the basement of old Artistic Drapery store on Ottawa Street North,
a steel door from some long forgotten vault mounted in a new wall blocked
the way when police moved in last night.

Hamilton firefighters opened a shortcut through a plywood wall and police
were inside after searching 18 minutes for the entrance.

The store -- an Ottawa Street landmark south of Cannon Street East run by
the Hayhurst family for 51 years before it closed in 1998 -- is unique
because it has a common basement beneath what were once five separate stores.

The pot growers have used the rooms for separate seasons. Throughout the
basement, police found more than 4,000 plants in various stages of
development, ranging from clones four or five inches tall to many more
standing above six feet.

If each plant produces 2.5 ounces for sale on the street at $1,000, there
was more than $4 million worth of marijuana in the basement.

"It is the largest single (grow operation) we have seen," Detective Paul
Henderson remarked. "But it is by no means the best quality."

Officers found three grow rooms and two clone sections in the basement. All
were filled with plants. A separate drying room had enough clotheslines to
outfit a neighbourhood.

One room had been divided into two sections to represent two different
seasons for the plants. Black mould thriving in the heat and moisture
decorated the end wall.

An estimated $100,000 worth of lights, timers, and air chillers along with
a brand new industrial size furnace kept the temperature around 31 C. The
operation was controlled from a separate electrical room running on stolen
hydro.

Police did not find any growers down in the basement when they raided the
building last night. But, Henderson said, they do have suspects they are
looking for.

Dating codes on the plastic coated heavy wiring strung throughout the
operation indicates the operation has been up and running since January
last year.

"It was an ongoing, and continuous operation," one officer said, meaning
the crop police spent the night bagging is not the first one produced
there. But it was the smell that gave the place away.

A sophisticated ventilation system pulled the moist humid air out of the
basement as it was replaced by fresh air from outside.

Fans pumped the tainted air through large ducts into city storm sewers from
basement drains in two of the grow rooms. Police patrolling the beat above
on Ottawa Street noticed the smell coming from a manhole a while ago. In
time, the odour was traced to the old Artistic building and search warrants
obtained.