Pot growers filled house with $1 million in plants

Jane Prendergast and Elaine Trumpey

Enquirer

October 28, 2010

Jennifer Rollins, who lives nearby with her husband and children, had no idea there was a marijuana grow operation and pot plants valued at more than $1 million inside.

“We were shocked when we heard what it was all about,” Rollins said Thursday. She lives on Paradise Cove near its intersection with Sunrise View Circle where Butler County Sheriff’s deputies busted two men Wednesday night after responding to a call about a chemical odor coming from the Sunrise house.

It’s a friendly neighborhood where neighbors pitched in and cooked dinners for her family when she had a baby recently, Rollins said.

She had never seen anyone at the house where the pot-growing operation was found, although her husband had occasionally noticed someone in and out at the house, she said.

The two men were arrested after deputies found about 1,050 marijuana plants and a sophisticated indoor grow operation inside the Liberty Township house. Each of the plants could have been sold on the street for about $1,000, the sheriff’s department said.

Deputies went to the house at about 8:40 p.m. Wednesday.

Firefighters found an open window at the back of the house, but when they tried to look inside, someone shoved a piece of drywall against the window to block the view, said Sgt. Todd Langmeyer, of the sheriff’s department’s criminal investigations unit.

Firefighters were still able to see what they thought was pot. And when a deputy approached the front door, he could smell what he thought was marijuana, Langmeyer said.

Once inside, deputies and officials from the sheriff’s department’s drug task force found the entire house being used as a pot-growing operation.

Officers found the plants in various stages of growth, some already harvested and hanging in separate rooms to dry. Ventilation ran from each room, including the basement and attic, Langmeyer said. Planting beds in almost every room measured 4 feet by 8 feet, with each containing hydroponically grown marijuana.

The two men, A. Bay Luong, 46, of Monroe, and Phuc Ky Luong, 50, whose listed address is Oakland, Calif., were found hiding in the attic. They were charged with cultivation of marijuana, a third-degree felony.

But those charges likely will be upgraded, Langmeyer said, once authorities weigh all the pot.

A relative of the suspects appears to own the $247,000 four-bedroom Colonial-style house that was built in 2007 and is valued at $247,000, according to the Butler County auditor.

“It’s a fulltime challenge to combat the war on drugs within the United States, including Butler County,” said Sheriff Richard K. Jones, whose office has twice recently intercepted shipments of pot hidden inside wooden bar units.

LINK TO PHOTOS OF HOUSE AND POT

http://news.cincinnati.com/article/20101028/NEWS010701/310280018/1167/NEWS/Pot-growers-filled-house-with-1-million-in-plants?GID=XYqSVwhRv8GzpzRAXOa1JVTljRiJSLaGFN7dw0Gwmsg%3D