Woman jailed after police sniff out cannabis grow

 A woman has been jailed after a large cannabis grow was sniffed out by passing police officers.

Officers were walking past the house in Laurel Avenue, Mansfield, when they noticed a strong smell of cannabis.

They looked through the letter box and could see a woman sleeping on the sofa. They knocked on the door and the woman shot up before running into another room.

The officers entered the property and found 105 plants across six rooms, including the basement and loft.

The electricity meter had been dangerously bypassed and Nottinghamshire Police’s cannabis dismantling team was called in to take down the set up and destroy the plants.

Brekena Reshiti (pictured above) was arrested at the scene. In a police interview, the 53-year-old told officers she’d been living at the property for several months and had been threatened with violence if she left the address or told anyone about the grow (pictured below).

She went on to plead guilty to producing a controlled drug of Class B and was jailed for eight months at Nottingham Crown Court on Monday (29 January).

Sergeant Chris Holloway, of Nottinghamshire Police, said:

“Thanks to the neighbourhood officers' instincts, we were able to disturb a sophisticated cannabis grow and stop the drugs getting on to our streets.

“All rooms in the house including the loft were being used to grow cannabis, the only exceptions being the living room and the kitchen.

“The electrics had been abstracted via the fuse box and so posed a significant fire risk to neighbouring homes.

“Reshiti claimed she had been threatened with violence if she left the property and this is quite possible. It is a technique used widely by the criminal gangs who are ultimately responsible for the majority of cannabis grows we attend.

“It also illustrates exactly why we take cannabis cultivation very seriously. The organised criminals involved are quite happy to exploit people and put the wider community at risk to line their own pockets.

“We will continue to carry out proactive raids such as this one to disrupt these drug operations and our work to tackle the organised criminals behind them continues.”