Personnel from the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) headquarters, the Narcotics Control Board and the National Headquarters Operation Unit raided the village of Koru in the Volta Region on 2 October 2012.[1] In the village they arrested five suspects with various quantities of dried leaves suspected to be cannabis, then moved to a farm about five kilometres away in thick forest, where they arrested Jamaican Wesley Appleton in his cottage.[1] Ten more suspects, including three women whose names were withheld, were found on the farm.[1]
The plantation covered about 400 acres (about 162 hectares), part of it already harvested and drying in the farmhouse, and officers retrieved about five tons of cannabis stored in fertilizer bags and plastic drums in the cottage.[1][2] The CID director-general called it the largest cannabis farm in the country’s history.[1] The farm and part of the harvested stock were then destroyed, and four unlicensed locally made cap guns were recovered from Appleton’s room.[1]
Police said they had watched Appleton since 2010, when intelligence indicated a Jamaican had acquired a large tract in the Alavanyo-Nkonya area for large-scale export cultivation, and that undercover agents located the Koru farm after he moved operations toward Nkwanta and employed local youths, including schoolchildren.[1] Appleton claimed ownership of the farm.[1] The second account says the cannabis was treated with insecticide and dried under hygienic conditions, with some finding its way abroad.[2]
