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chickenman

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Huge pot grow ‘pretty brazen’
9,200 plants discovered a ‘good football’s throw’ from I-70 near De Beque
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A drug task force member with the Mesa County Sheriff’s Department carries two armloads of marjuana plantsThursday from the landing zone to a dump truck that will take the plants to the Mesa County Landfill.


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One of two suspects arrested at the illegal grow operation Thursday morning sits in handcuffs and guarded by a DEA agent.


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By Gabrielle Porter
Thursday, September 7, 2017

Well before dawn Thursday, about a dozen local and federal law enforcement agents drove to an abandoned well pad near De Beque, shouldered some 60 pounds of gear each and began a three-mile trek through the chilly dark of the Colorado River banks by way of Union Pacific railroad tracks.

Agents with night optics peered down from cliffs on either side of Interstate 70, and three Mesa County Sheriff’s Office boats took to the river as the team made its way to one of two river islands they believed were home to a massive illegal marijuana grow guarded by three armed men.

A Drug Enforcement Agency plane and helicopter provided support from above and Colorado State Patrol troopers posted on a closed lane of I-70 to cut off escape. Another team headed to the second island, where they believed they would find more plants but no campsite.

Navigating a dense tangle of tamarisk and cottonwood trees and hampered by the canyon’s infamously poor cellphone and radio reception, the first team surprised the three men in a makeshift camp, who instantly fled.

Two of the three were quickly caught, at about 7 a.m. — both young men whose names were not released by the DEA Thursday.

More than 9,200 marijuana plants were collected between the two islands, which one federal employee described as not more than a “good football’s throw” from I-70.

“They’re pretty brazen,” said Steven Knight, group supervisor for the DEA’s Grand Junction office. “If you were driving down I-70 and pulled over, you could see the marijuana.”

Agents and officers Thursday evening were still looking for the third suspect, described as a Hispanic man wearing a black T-shirt. Knight said during the day he believed the third man was hiding out on the small but thickly vegetated island where the men’s campsite was found.

“You get in there, it’s easy to hide,” he said.

The De Beque Canyon Grow case began in May, Knight said, although it was really triggered by an odd 2016 event. A man was caught trying to sneak into the river islands area with some 8,000 marijuana seeds in his pockets.

In May this year, a Bureau of Land Management employee and a sheriff’s deputy decided to go up a nearby cliff and try to see if anybody ever returned to the spot, Knight said.

“They went up top and looked down,” he said. “They saw what looked like a gas can and some equipment. … We just started watching them from the cliffs up high.”

Knight said surveillance showed what appeared to be three men living on the smaller island and patrolling two grows with rifles.

For the next several months, Knight said, they watched the trio to learn more, waiting until the plants they were tending were closer to harvest.

“There was no hurry on our part,” he said. “They were isolated.”

Thursday morning turned into a waiting game for agents and officers staged at Island Acres State Park while the team on the river island played hide-and-seek with the third suspect.

Around 9 a.m. the first of the two suspects — shirtless with a bandaged cut on one of his bare feet — was brought to the staging area, where he was ushered to a shaded picnic table area and advised of his rights.

Half an hour later, when the second suspect arrived at the park with a Colorado State Patrol trooper, the first suspect grinned and called out to him.

Knight, walking between the two, spun around.

“Hey,” Knight shouted. “Cállate” — “Shut up,” in Spanish.

The suspects told agents they were cousins from Sinaloa state in Mexico, Knight told his team. The first suspect claimed about 6,000 plants were on the two islands.

“They’ve been sent here to set up this grow,” Knight said.

It was after 11 a.m. when the DEA helicopter started lifting slings full of hundreds of uprooted marijuana plants from the river islands and dropping them off at Island Acres State Park, where curious campers stood watching from a short distance and buzzed by in golf carts.

By mid-afternoon, the team had found much more than 6,000 marijuana plants; according to DEA spokesman Jim Gothe the final tally topped more than 9,200 plants.

The two suspects were due to be arraigned this afternoon in federal court in Grand Junction.

Knight said that while outdoor grows of comparable sizes have been raided in the region in the past, the De Beque Canyon grow is the largest operation he’s dealt with since transferring to Grand Junction a year ago.

“But the boldness of doing it right next to the highway?” Knight said. “And these guys are not from Colorado.”

Some 50 to 60 law enforcement officers from multiple agencies were involved in the operation, Knight said, including representatives of the sheriff’s office, the Grand Junction Police Department, the Western Colorado Drug Task Force, Colorado State Patrol, the FBI, the Bureau of Land Management, the U.S. Marshals Service, the National Guard, and DEA operatives from the West Slope as well as Salt Lake City and Colorado Springs.

Knight praised the sheer physical effort of the team that responded to the islands and “pushed through the brush they could hardly get through.”

“A pretty heroic effort,” he said. “I’m proud of them.”
 
chickenman

chickenman

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well at least they wont have to trim all dat up...
 
cannabeans

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Knight praised the sheer physical effort of the team that responded to the islands and “pushed through the brush they could hardly get through.”

“A pretty heroic effort,” he said. “I’m proud of them.”

I usually woulnd not say such a thing.. But in this case... It must be said and I agree!
 
LocalGrowGuy

LocalGrowGuy

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Just a few poor mexicans trying to put beans and rice on the table..
Maybe if California avocado producers didn't shit the bed this year there wouldn't be an influx of 'a few poor mexicans'.

Also, just kidding. I hate guacamole.
 
jipp

jipp

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fuck the war on drugs, and fuck the head of the DEA. your opinion is a lie, and hurtful to mankind; being in the position you hold.


anyhow, bowl up.
 
jipp

jipp

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a plant counts is just another way to control the populace, and bring money in.. nothing more.. this is about money.

id rather have all them DEA agents who went and chopped down innocent fucking plants helping. they should be helping with relief aid, and helping their fellow man out in time of need..

its fucked up. this plant has major medical value. id rather have people who just want to get fucked up using it to release stress. instead of drinking heavy, which can lead to health issues. just like the fucking pills i was on.

what we really need to have done: is to have it reschedule obv ( how is it scheduled the way it is, come on people! this should be your fucking first clue ). its the only way, "we the people" will have the right to the plant. before pills, we all used herbs and shit.. before DuPont,

rock on.
 
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jipp

jipp

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"Fortunately, cannabis always seems to help. In fact, states with legalized marijuana have lower opioid overdose mortality rates."

the random shit you find just cruising for info. opiates are all over the fucking map. i quit in time i guess, and on my own terms. i have not fact based this.. but just finding random shit like this makes you wonder about pills.

herb does help with opiate withdrawals and will be the answer to the epidemic.. the fact is, im proof ( i have no fucking agenda, i just want people to be healthy ). but for me, whats more import is that it helps with my chronic pain. with THC i do not need opiates, nor do i want them.
 
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Freshone

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These guys were cartel...They were not poor old mexicans trying to put beans and rice on the table..
Canna,your right cartel all the way but these guys are just doing what their told because if they dont they will kill them or maybe their wife and kids?
You will never see a cartel boss in the mix.
Thing that bothers me about this deal was they could of took these guys out months ago,got the same charges,protected the public from them,maybe saved some natural resources and saved the taxpayer a couple million in the process but they chose to drag it out for a year?that overtime Money must be good.
 
chickenman

chickenman

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That county cashes in on drug busts..
Many times weekly there are reports of vehicles stopped on I70 3 to 10 miles in state from Utah that are pulled over for not staying in lane, turn signal violation, petty observations that they end up searching and busting all kinds of folk with all kinds of drugs..and cash as well.....
Was headed out the last time and there they were, luggage out of vehicle, suspects cuffed and walking toward cop car...
Also the bus station....
Now however the state supreme court ruled a sniff from drug dog is no longer reason to search in Colorado since MJ is no longer illegal in statel...
 
cannabeans

cannabeans

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Canna,your right cartel all the way but these guys are just doing what their told because if they dont they will kill them or maybe their wife and kids?
You will never see a cartel boss in the mix.
Thing that bothers me about this deal was they could of took these guys out months ago,got the same charges,protected the public from them,maybe saved some natural resources and saved the taxpayer a couple million in the process but they chose to drag it out for a year?that overtime Money must be good.
100% agree with you!
 
chickenman

chickenman

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Well ya got to at least give them growers some respect...
9000 plus plants, they had to plant seeds, 18,000 or so?? then sex out males, water, feed, guard, get across the river worry about getting busted, real hot and dry in that area...
 
chickenman

chickenman

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Men face decade in prison if guilty in pot case
By Mike Wiggins
Friday, September 8, 2017

Two cousins from Mexico learned Friday they could spend at least a decade in prison if convicted on charges related to a federal drug investigation that uncovered more than 9,000 marijuana plants growing in the middle of the Colorado River.

Shackled and dressed in yellow jumpsuits, Santos Ramirez-Alvarez, 37, and Santos Ramirez-Carrillo, 32, made their first appearance in a federal courtroom in Grand Junction. U.S. Magistrate Judge Gordon Gallagher advised the men, through an interpreter, that they could each be charged with a count of conspiracy to manufacture 1,000 or more marijuana plants. The charge carries a possible sentence of 10 years to life in federal prison.

With U.S. marshals and Drug Enforcement Administration agents sitting in the back of the courtroom, Gallagher appointed attorneys for both men. They will return to court on Wednesday, when Gallagher will decide whether to release them on bond while their cases are pending.

A criminal complaint detailing the cases against the two men was not available to the public on Friday.

Roughly a dozen federal and local law enforcement officers descended on a makeshift camp in the river close to Interstate 70 in De Beque Canyon before dawn Thursday and arrested two men. A third man escaped and was still at large on Friday.

Federal agents collected more than 9,200 marijuana plants from two islands in the river.

Steven Knight, group supervisor for the DEA’s Grand Junction office, told The Daily Sentinel authorities launched the so-called De Beque Canyon Grow case in May. Surveillance showed three men living on the smaller of the two islands and patrolling two marijuana grows with rifles.

Jeff Dorschner, spokesman for the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Denver, said the men are cousins and have family in the Sinaloa state of Mexico.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Jeremy Chaffin told the court Friday several hundred of the marijuana plants will be held at the DEA office in Grand Junction for 15 days to give defense attorneys an opportunity to examine them. After that, prosecutors will seek to destroy them due to decomposition and the risk of the plants catching fire. Chaffin said the remainder of the plants have already been disposed of at the Mesa County Landfill.
 
Freshone

Freshone

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Total propaganda story,we see this all the time in California.These Guys will claim they were forced under threat of great bodily harm to them or their family and will ask for asylum,notice the reference to Sinaloa in each story?cartel ground zero.Most that will happen is a conviction and time served and MAYBE deportation and they will be right back at it.They are coached what to say before they even come here.Only ones making money in this case are the cops.
 
Dan789

Dan789

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Bet ole Sessions went off in his pants when he heard the news.
 
LocalGrowGuy

LocalGrowGuy

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That county cashes in on drug busts..
Many times weekly there are reports of vehicles stopped on I70 3 to 10 miles in state from Utah that are pulled over for not staying in lane, turn signal violation, petty observations that they end up searching and busting all kinds of folk with all kinds of drugs..and cash as well.....
Was headed out the last time and there they were, luggage out of vehicle, suspects cuffed and walking toward cop car...
Also the bus station....
Now however the state supreme court ruled a sniff from drug dog is no longer reason to search in Colorado since MJ is no longer illegal in statel...
It's a bit more complicated but it's great for patients.
 
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