POLICE RAIDS YIELD 285 CANNABIS PLANTS

The police are holding two men for questioning following the discovery of 285 cannabis plants in two separate raids on two private residences in Zejtun yesterday.

This is believed to be the largest haul of cannabis plants in one day in Malta.

The police drugs squad first raided an old residence in Santa Marija Street at daybreak.

The occupant, a 42-year-old man from Zejtun, who lives on his own, was arrested and is expected to be charged in court soon.

Police Superintendent Neil Harrison and Inspector Norbert Ciappara led the raid and the search, during which, apart from the cannabis plants, a considerable sum of money and some jewellery were also seized.

For most of the morning the police could be seen removing cannabis plants from two glasshouses on the roof of the one-storey building.

They found a total of 110 large cannabis plants, a substantial number of which were one metre high, as well as 84 pots in which seeds had been planted.

The seizure also included a quantity of cannabis leaves in plastic bags, which were ready to be marketed, a number of baskets and sacks containing more dried cannabis leaves, leaves still in the drying process and a set of reflectors believed to have been used for growing the plant.

Magistrate Consuelo Scerri Herrera appointed a team of court experts to help her in an inquiry.

In another raid in the afternoon, the drugs squad found about 175 cannabis plants in a private residence in Il-Mithna Alley in the same area of the house where the first raid was carried out.

The police said that most of the plants were also up to one metre high.  Items connected with the cultivation and trafficking of cannabis were found by the police inside the house.

More dried cannabis leaves in plastic bags, also believed to have been prepared for sale, were found.

The police said the electricity metres at the residence had been tampered with.

Another 42-year-old man, also from Zejtun, was held for questioning and is expected to be arraigned shortly, the police said.

Duty Magistrate Giovanni Grixti opened an inquiry.

In January last year the police found about 125 cannabis plants at a residence in Zejtun, just round the corner from the place raided yesterday.  Some of the plants were over three metres high and were found in pots and in the grounds of an internal courtyard of the uninhabited house.

A man from Zejtun and another from Marsascala had been charged in connection with that case.