New South Wales police have arrested five men and seized $2.4 million worth of cannabis from a “highly sophisticated” drug operation south of Sydney.
Superintendent Zoran Dzevlan from the Lake Illawarra LAC said officers were patrolling an industrial park in Port Kembla about 2:00am on Friday morning when their suspicions were first raised.
“General duties police located a car they believed to be suspicious,” he said.
“Further inquiries led them to a warehouse.”
The officers entered the warehouse where they found five men allegedly working on a sophisticated hydroponic set-up.
“When they entered, they observed a large sophisticated cannabis hydroponic cultivation,” Superintendent Dzevlan said.
The men, aged between 24 and 44, were arrested and charged with the cultivation of a large commercial quantity of cannabis.
After further investigations, police visited another industrial park in Unanderra where they found a second commercial set-up, believed to be part of the same operation.
Superintendent Zoran said police seized drugs with a street value of $2.4 million across both warehouses.
“In total almost 1,200 cannabis plants [of] varying sizes as well as almost 110 kilograms of dry cannabis leaf,” he said.
“I’ve never seen such a sophisticated hydroponic enterprise.”
Superintendent Zoran was full of praise for the patrolling officers who made the discovery.
“These results were not achieved by chance, but as a result of the old-fashioned instinctive traits that police officers have, together with dedicated and persistent police work,” he said.
“Importantly, this has resulted in almost $2.5 million in drugs being removed from our streets.”