Series: Part 2 Of 5

GROWBUSTERS

Growers Are Most Often People Of Vietnamese Descent

VANCOUVER -- A Kitchener woman of Vietnamese descent says she is saddened
by the number of grow houses run by local members of the Vietnamese
community. "The Canadian law is very easy on them. Why don't we put them in
jail?" said Thi Nguyen, a mother of two who has lived in Waterloo Region
for more than 16 years.

Nguyen and her husband have toiled in low-paying factory jobs to put their
daughter through university and their son through college.

"Canada is a good country. You can earn money and pay your bills," she said
in an interview.

"They (growers) want to make easy money."

Waterloo regional police have made 91 raids relating to grow houses in the
past two years. All but about six were operated by people of Vietnamese
descent, police say.

In Vancouver, police say 85 per cent of grow operations are run by
Vietnamese, two per cent by outlaw bikers and the rest by small-time
growers trying to make some extra money.

Vietnamese-language newspapers and magazines in Vancouver are chock full of
ads for hydroponic stores and for lawyers who will represent growers who
get busted.

Some of the Vietnamese growers are at the bottom of the totem pole, but
others are organized criminals, police say.

Vancouver drug cop Viggo Elvevoll said many Vietnamese work in "cells" and
have close associates outside the country. On the cellular phone bill of
one grower, police found calls to Amsterdam, Hong Kong and South America.

"They have very good contacts," Elvevoll said.

Jim Fisher, a detective with the Vancouver police intelligence branch, said
much of the profits are funnelled back to Vietnam, where they are used to
buy homes and businesses.

When it comes to growing pot, the Vietnamese are experts, police say.

Time and time again, drug cops, many with more than 20 years experience,
encounter large healthy plants bursting with bud -- the favoured marijuana
flower, which produces the pot smoked by millions across North America.

In Vancouver, where drug cops raid at least 10 homes a week, it's not
uncommon to find plants as high as small Christmas trees, with bamboo
sticks holding them up to keep the precious bud near the high-wattage light
bulbs.

It usually takes four plants to produce one pound of bud. But police once
found a plant that yielded a pound of flower on its own.

"Their grows are beautiful and they have the highest THC
(tetrahydrocannabinol) level (the active ingredient producing the high).
That's why it's wanted all over the world," said Sgt. Rollie Woods, head of
the drug unit of the Vancouver city police.

Conventionally grown South American pot, like that found in a huge
container that sailed into Vancouver harbour from Ecuador last year,
doesn't come close.

"That's like sending ice to Inuvik," Woods said.

Another group of criminals is profiting from Vancouver's pot-growers. They
can't be bothered with all the work -- so they rob them instead.

Victims describe the incidents to Vancouver police as home invasions. There
have been 19 since 1998, but police suspect most go unreported.

In February, police were called to a Vancouver home at 3 a.m. and found a
45-year-old man with gaping head wounds, suffered when he was beaten with a
crowbar.

Three men had broken into his home, police said. One went downstairs and
gathered the dried marijuana bud while the other two terrorized the man and
his 39-year-old wife.

She tried to stop the man with the crowbar, Woods said, until another man
with a small pistol told her: "If you shut up, I won't kill you."

Meanwhile, the couple's five-year-old child slept through the ordeal.

One more than one occasion, home grow robbers, also usually of Vietnamese
descent, have gone to the wrong door and terrorized innocent neighbours.

Waterloo regional police says they haven't yet heard about any violence
relating to home grows. But it's only a matter of time, they fear.