Carlisle Crown Court jailed joiner Paul Nicholas Carter, 50, for two years after he admitted running a cannabis farm on the outskirts of Carlisle and stealing the electricity to heat it.[1] Carter, from Cocklakes Yard in Cockermouth, had pleaded guilty to both offences at an earlier hearing.[1]
Police called at Newhouse Farm on Orton Road in September 2013 and found 110 cannabis plants that had yet to reach full maturity, housed in units Carter leased at the farm.[1] Officers could hear the whirr of fans on the upper floor as they entered, and described the set-up as a relatively sophisticated operation.[1] Prosecuting counsel said the crop would have yielded more than 7kg wholesale, worth 25,155 pounds.[1]
The court heard the electricity supplier had been called out at a cost of 610 pounds and the diverted supply totalled 1,928 pounds.[1] Carter’s defence said a shoulder injury and prescription painkillers had put him in contact with the operation’s main drivers, to whom he owed money, and that he was invited to host the farm in the loft to pay off the debt.[1] Judge Paul Batty QC said police accepted Carter was not at the top of the organisation but that he had never been prepared to name the others involved, adding that Carter was in it for the money and no other reason.[1] Carter received a concurrent six-month term for diverting the electricity.[1]
