Cannabis factory man ordered to leave Ireland

A Vietnamese man who converted a rented house into a cannabis growing factory has been given a suspended sentence on condition that he leave the country immediately.

A Vietnamese man who converted a rented house into a cannabis growing factory has been given a part suspended sentence on condition that he leave the country immediately.

Thang Nguyen (aged 32) with an address at Swords Road, Santry has been on remand in prison pending sentence for the last 11 months after a warrant was issued for his arrest when he failed to appear at a previous court hearing.

"We have enough of our home-grown criminals," Judge O'Donnell commented when he sentenced Nguyen for what he described as "a very sophisticated offence".

He sentenced Nguyen to three years in prison but suspended the remaining two years and one month of it, on the condition that he be deported or leave Ireland voluntarily and not return for 10 years.

Nguyen pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to cultivation of cannabis without a license at the house on Claude Road, Drumcondra on June 6, 2007. He had no previous convictions.

Garda Peter Breen told Mr Sean Guerin BL, prosecuting, that the second floor in the house and the attic had been converted into a "cultivation factory" for the growing of cannabis.

He said when the house was first rented there were two bedrooms on the first floor and an attic bedroom.

Gardaí searched the house in June 2007 following confidential information and a found a plastic sheet draped across the entire width of the staircase. A small bathroom had been used as a pumping station to irrigate the mature plants on the first floor and the young plants, in what was effectively a nursery, in the attic.

Garda Breen said that the electricity meter had been elaborately "by-passed" to provide 14.4 Kilowatts of electricity to the filtration, heating and lighting systems that had been used to cultivate the cannabis while the downstairs in the house was using electricity as normal from the grid.

There were 90 mature plants, all more than five feet tall, on the first floor and almost as many younger smaller plants in the attic, which Gda Breen said led to "a strong smell of cannabis in the house".

He said that fertilizer was found in the shed in the back garden, while "pods", used to grow the cannabis seeds, were found in the kitchen.

Gda Breen told Mr Guerin that Nguyen was arrested in the house when garda arrived with the warrant to search the premises.

He initially denied all knowledge of the cannabis and its cultivation but his fingerprints were later found on a number of transformers and other items in the attic of the house.

A Vietnamese couple, who "turned a blind eye" to the "factory", were given a one-year suspended sentence by Judge Martin Nolan last June, after they pleaded guilty to knowingly suffering, or failing to report, the cultivation of the plants.

It was accepted that Oanh Thuy Ngo (aged 25) of Claude Road, Dublin 9, and Thanh Ngoc Ngugen (aged 32) of Swords Road, Santry were not involved in actually growing the cannabis as there fingerprints were never found on any of the equipment.

Ngo was one of a number of people that signed the lease for the house in April 2006 but gardaí accepted that she had agreed to do this as "a favour".

Gda Breen agreed with Mr Peter Finlay SC, defending, that Nguyen had not signed the lease for the house.

He accepted that another man, who fled the scene when gardaí arrived, has since left the jurisdiction and has yet to be charged.

Gda Breen further accepted that this man was further up the operation than Nguyen.

Mr Finlay told Judge O'Donnell that his client "in weakness" allowed himself to be used by this person who has since fled the jurisdiction.

He said it is believed that this other man, who Nguyen first became acquainted with in 2006, is involved in "some sort of gang".

"Thankfully the drugs were confiscated and they did not get onto the market," Mr Finlay said before he added that whatever illegal enterprise his client was involved in, he was not in it for very long.