Seven people have been killed in the last five years in England and Wales in incidents linked to break-ins or attempted burglaries at houses or factories which have been converted into cannabis farms.
On top of that stark statistic, in May 2022 four Vietnamese nationals died in a fire in a disused mill in Oldham, near Manchester, which is believed to have been used to grow cannabis.
Grace Robinson, a criminologist and CEO of Black Box Research and Consultancy, said: “Drug trafficking organisations have undoubtedly realised that growing cannabis in the UK is a more profitable and easier option than importing or smuggling it.”
Robinson told The Epoch Times: “Obviously due to the nature of the trade in illicit drugs, it’s difficult for growers and sellers to seek justice through legal means, leaving them vulnerable to theft and violence. It’s often children and vulnerable adults responsible for maintaining cannabis farms therefore those robbing them are rarely deterred by their presence.”
Last month Labour’s shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper said young illegal immigrants were being trafficked across the English Channel and employed in “cannabis farms“ or in ”prostitution.”
Immigration Minister Robert Jenrick told House of Commons last month that of the 4,600 unaccompanied children who had been accommodated in hotels since July 2021, “200 children remain missing, 13 of whom are under 16 years of age, and only one of whom is female.”
He said 176 of those 200 teenagers were Albanian nationals.
Cooper said nobody was properly investigating the links between illegal immigration and organised crime like cannabis farming.
She told the BBC: “There’s no targeted unit going after them and saying ‘Look, this is a pattern,’ where young people are being trafficked across the Channel and then into cannabis farms or into prostitution in some of the worst cases ... being picked up from outside these hotels.”
The National Crime Agency said the illegal enterprise, which had 1,500 cannabis plants worth £1 million on three floors of the building, was the “largest and most sophisticated cannabis factory” it had ever come across.
‘Very Easy’ to Set Up Cannabis Farm
Barker told The Epoch Times: “It is very easy to do and it’s very easy to get the cannabis seeds online.”But he said: “What a lot of people probably don’t realise is that the actual cannabis market is quite a violent one and probably one that has a lot of dark, hidden secrets to it.”
“There’s a lot of human trafficking involved in cannabis production. We get a lot of individuals for example, you know, coming from various parts of Asia to be trafficked through the UK to help with the production of cannabis farms and then obviously, those individuals are for example, those people who are obviously, potentially are at risk of being caught or even potentially being at risk of a victim of violent crime,” added Barker.
In December 2021, Xhovan Pepaj, a 25-year-old Albanian national, was stabbed to death while minding a cannabis factory in Tunbridge Wells, Kent.
Eleven people, aged from 17 to 51, have been charged with his murder and the first of two murder trials is currently under way in a new “super court” in Loughborough in the Midlands.
Barker told The Epoch Times: “These kind of farms are born out of prohibition. Now, that’s not to say that if we legalise cannabis, that these would all be eradicated. We would still have kind of cannabis mass production, we'd still have ultimately a black cannabis market. We have a black alcohol market. We have a black market in cigarettes.”
Substance Abuse Rising During Cost-of-Living Crisis
Barker said there had been a big increase in alcohol and drug consumption since the pandemic started and he said: “What we’re seeing now, in terms of the cost of living crisis, is we’re seeing people come into our service saying their substance use has either started, or it’s been exacerbated ... because they’re experiencing a significant amount of stress and anxiety in terms of whether they can afford their bills over the next few months.”He said there was also anecdotal evidence of people who were unemployed or on low incomes dealing drugs to “make ends meet.”
- In March 2018 Jack Williams was murdered when a group led by heroin addict and convicted killer Jonny Donne burst into his home in Swansea, where he had a small-scale cannabis grow. Donne was later jailed for life.
- In February 2020 Khuzaimah Douglas tried to burgle a cannabis farm in Brierley Hill, near Birmingham, run by Saghawat Ramzan and his family. Ramzan fired a crossbow, killing Douglas as well as his own brother Waseem. He was later jailed for life.
- In July 2020 Skender Ismaili was killed during a cannabis factory burglary in Enfield, north London. A man was convicted of manslaughter.
- In January 2021 Tomasz Waga, 20, was part of a gang from London who tried to burgle a cannabis farm in Cardiff. Last month two Albanians, Josif Nushi, 27, and Mihal Dhana, 29, were jailed for life for his murder.
- Renato Geci, who had been guarding a cannabis grow in Hounslow, west London, was murdered in March 2021. Shaddai Smith, 32, and Jason Sebran, 38, were jailed for life last year.
- Then in October 2021 a gang from Sheffield travelled to Birmingham to burgle a cannabis factory. A shotgun was fired but miraculously nobody was killed.
- In December 2021 Xhovan Pepaj was stabbed during a cannabis farm burglary in Tunbridge Wells, Kent.
- Four Vietnamese nationals died in a fire at Bismark House Mill, a derelict mill in Oldham, Greater Manchester in May 2021. It is understood the mill may have been converted to a cannabis farm at the time.
