Bust not a first for neighbourhood
Posted Jun 6, 2011 06:34:59 PM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
A multi-million dollar drug bust by regional police continues a string of raids in the same south Kitchener neighbourhood.
This latest seizure, worth more than $6-million, happened at a home on Knox Court. In the fall of 2008, a Knox Court home was one of two homes raided in as many days. It yielded a haul of almost $1-million worth of marijuana and it came just a day before a raid on Pine Valley Drive that netted police another $1-million worth of drugs. Knox Court is nestled off Pine Valley Drive and the homes were literally doors apart from one another.
“People are going to place marijuana grow ops in locations where they don’t believe they’re going to get detected,” says Staff Sergeant Craig Ambrose, head of the drug unit with Waterloo Regional Police. “So if they can put them into an industrial unit and make it appear as though they’re carrying on a normal business, or if they’re not going to get a call about suspicious activity, that’s where they’re going to place them.”
The latter has been cited as one of the reasons the relatively new subdivision in south Kitchener has become a seemingly popular place for grow ops. Several such operations have been dismantled in recent years and reasons as to why range from the relative affluence of the neighbourhood where such activity would not be considered typical as well as its newness, which means neighbours don’t know each other very well and would thus be less suspicious of behaviours.
The area, not far from Conestoga College, also offers easy access to the 401. Ties to Toronto were uncovered in the two raids in 2008, lending substance to the suggestion that access to the 401 corridor makes the neighbourhood attractive to grow ops.
This latest raid was the result of several months worth of police work.
“We started an investigation several months ago thanks to some information from the public,” Ambrose states. “We managed to put together a bit of a criminal enterprise that we could culminate with the execution of several warrants.”
Three men, all from Waterloo Region, have been charged in this latest investigation. Ambrose says no further charges are anticipated against the suspects arrested.
