METRO VANCOUVER -- Abbotsford police arrested two men after uncovering a multi-million dollar marijuana growing operation and large ammunition cache hidden under a barn with a James Bond-like retractable concrete floor.
A 48-year-old Abbotsford man and a 31-year-old Mission man are facing production, possession and trafficking charges.
Members of the Municipal Integrated Emergency Response Team (MIERT), Abbotsford police and the RCMP executed two simultaneous warrants shortly after noon Thursday on a sprawling property in the 6400 block of Lefeuvre Road and on a home in the 34000 block of Catchpole Avenue in Mission.
Police suspect the grow-op had been in operation for several years, and was capable of producing more than 700 pounds of marijuana a year.
Abbotsford police Staff Sgt. Dave Schmirler said the underground bunker featured motion sensors and surveillance equipment along with advanced construction techniques.
"In my experience, this was probably the most sophisticated grow operation I've seen or am aware of in Abbotsford," he said.
"The retractable floor had a concrete top on it, and in the up position was practically [unnoticeable]. It was like an invisible door when it went down.
"Like in Raiders of the Lost Ark," he said.
Schmirler said the facility was several thousand square feet in size, featured an automated watering and lighting system and housed more than 1,750 plants with a substantial quantity of dried product also on site.
Several rifles and thousands of rounds of ammunition were also seized in the raid, which Schmirler described as part of larger, ongoing operation.
With marijuana production almost exclusively controlled by organized crime, Schmirler said the investigation is ongoing and detectives had not conclusively linked the men arrested to either the Red Scorpions or the UN gang.
Describing the bust as substantial, Schmirler said with this one raid police have struck a serious blow to marijuana production in the city.
"We have taken a substantial amount of product and potential [manufacture] of product out of the Abbotsford Community."
Abbotsford Times
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