CANADA HIGH ON POT LIST

No. 3 Supplier to the U.S.

Canada trails only the corruption-riddled regimes of Mexico and Colombia as
the top supplier of killer-quality weed to the U.S., says Ontario's Public
Safety and Security Commissioner.

"That's not something to be proud of," Bob Runciman told The Sun. "We can
see the United States wanting us to play a more active role in dealing with
this."

Runciman - meeting with provincial and federal justice ministers in Calgary
this week - plans to push for minimum sentences for pot house operators
once he's there.

Police now cite "catch and release justice" as a key problem in the
proliferation of marijuana-growing operations, Runciman said.

Edmonton's Sgt. Glen Hayden agreed.

"I've seen it for years," he said. "I was in the drug section until about
eight months ago for eight years. I'm too familiar with it."

Edmonton's drug section busted somewhere between 60 and 90 growing
operations in 2000 and 2001, sometimes raiding one home a week, Hayden
said. Cops in Ontario estimate indoor marijuana growing is a $1-billion a
year business there, the third-largest agricultural cash crop.

Operators usually rent houses, steal power and leave the place in shambles
and a fire hazard, police said.

Offenders in the U.S. are usually handed stiff jail terms, but it's not
unusual for convicted growers in Canada to get a conditional sentence or
short jail term.

However, Hayden said he thinks changing the access local police departments
have to the proceeds of crime they seize will do far more to curb growing
operations than stiffer penalties.

Canada's proceeds-of-crime legislation was fashioned to prevent cops from
targeting people because they're rich, Hayden said.

"But in the same vein, if he's rich and he's making all kinds of proceeds
from drugs, why wouldn't we target him? Why wouldn't we use his resources
to target someone else down the road? It's something we don't have when it
comes to budget time."

Senator Tommy Banks - part of a Senate subcommittee that recently
recommended criminal code exemptions for licensed growers of marijuana and
simple possession - wants anyone illegally growing marijuana jailed and
their assets seized.

"I'm talking about the big ones, the hydroponic ones where there are
mass-producing," he said. "They should always be illegal when they're not
properly licensed and properly regulated."

As for Canada's ranking as the third-largest supplier of quality weed,
Banks said the situation is "horrible."

"The grow operations that I'm talking about, that I regard as criminal and
whose stuff ought to be forfeited, are the ones that are for profit, that
are for criminal activity."