A pot grow-op in Likely, B.C. contained thousands of plants in eight properties.
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By Ryan Starr - Surrey North Delta Leader
Published: September 02, 2008 3:00 PM
Updated: September 02, 2008 5:34 PM
Four Surrey men are among those charged in connection with a massive marijuana grow-op bust east of Williams Lake that yielded 33,319 pot plants and 11 kilograms of marijuana bud from eight properties.
Thea Om, 30, Sao Mei, 41, Pauv (Paul) Som, 35, and Sophek Hel, 37, have been charged with production of marijuana and possession of a controlled substance for the purpose of trafficking. (Om faces two counts of each charge.)
Four other men from the Lower Mainland have also been charged. All are scheduled to appear in Williams Lake Provincial Court on Sept. 10.
Each could face life in jail and the properties could be seized under the Civil Forfeiture Act or the Criminal Code of Canada, police say.
The bust culminates a year-long investigation into a series of grow operations in the rural community of Likely, east of Williams Lake.
Between September and November 2007, search warrants were executed on eight properties in Likely, all linked to the same organized crime group, police say. Prior to this project, the RCMP executed five search warrants on properties in the Likely area associated to the same crime group.
These earlier warrants resulted in the seizure of 11,807 pot plants, bringing the total amount of plants seized from the group to 45,126 since the first warrant was executed in November 2006.
From the previous warrants, two Surrey men were convicted of production of a controlled substance and one property has been forfeited to the provincial government.
rstarr@surreyleader.com
