Victoria Police raided hydroponics shops in Melton and Werribee, houses across Melbourne’s western and northern suburbs and a farm near Bacchus Marsh on Thursday 9 February 2006, arresting seven people in a crackdown on hydroponic cannabis crop houses.[1][2] Three of the men appeared in the Melbourne Magistrates Court the next day.[1]
A 50-year-old man arrested at the farm was remanded in custody charged with cultivating and trafficking commercial quantities of cannabis after police found 102 plants growing hydroponically.[1] A 42-year-old man arrested at the Melton shop was released on bail after being charged with trafficking commercial quantities of cannabis, ecstasy and cocaine; police said they seized half a kilogram of cannabis worth $3,000 alongside about 100 grams of cocaine and 50 ecstasy tablets.[1] A 24-year-old man was bailed on an ecstasy trafficking charge and four other men were to be charged on summons.[1]
The raids, led by Acting Detective Senior Sergeant Jason Kelly, ended a six-month operation by the cannabis unit of the Major Drug Investigation Division, and police said more arrests would follow.[1][2] Police said they had arrested 51 people over the previous year and seized 2,086 plants and about 130 kilograms of cannabis head worth more than $6 million in 2005.[1]
