Police found a sophisticated cannabis-growing operation in a large house in a Welsh town which could have been worth up to a £250,000 to the London-based gang running it, a court has heard. When officers swooped on the property they found 123 large plants growing in six rooms of the detached property along with a lighting and ventilation system and a further 169 seedlings being propagated in trays. Outside the house was a BMW car which the cannabis gang was using to ferry supplies across the border.
Two Albanian nationals were also found at the house and Swansea Crown Court heard one of them was introduced to the gang running the operation while he was working at a car wash while the other had entered the UK via a small boat crossing of the English Channel.
Brian Simpson, prosecuting, said on November 24 last year police executed a search warrant at a large isolated detached house in Llanbadarn near Aberystwyth. In the house were two men – Elidon Zeka and Morin Lalaj. The court heard officers found six room of the house had been given over to the growing of cannabis with insulation boards over the windows, plastic sheeting on the floors, and lights, fans, and a ventilation system. A total of 123 large young plants were found with another 169 seedlings growing in trays and propagators in the kitchen. The electricity meter to the property had been bypassed. Lalaj's fingerprints were later found on the fridge in the house and on a number of dehumidifiers.
