Jail for man who set up drugs farm

A commercial cannabis farmer who duped an electricity firm into funding his £130,000 operation has been jailed.

And after being caught Michael Craft tried convincing authorities his 94 plant hydroponic set-up was to feed his own addiction.

But a judge dubbed the highly organised factory, spread across three rooms of his Ashford home, a “significant commercial cannabis production business”.

Canterbury Crown Court heard the 39-year-old paid an accomplice to rig his electricity meter so UK Power Networks shelled out for the operation.

When officers attended his Kingsnorth home in January last year and asked what they’d find inside, Craft replied: “Well now I’m going to go to prison.”

Judge Rupert Lowe sentenced Craft to two years and eight months for his enterprise, where cannabis was produced in waves.

Prosecutors explained the front room, equipped with hydroponic lights, housed 29 plants and the backroom 65 plants.

A separate drying room also contained bags of the Class B drug ready to be dispatched, with the total street value a maximum of £130,000.

The court heard officers discovered a cryptic piece of card in Craft’s pocket containing the letters ‘M’, ‘H’ and ‘D’ - it transpired the code related to cultivation amounts.

Craft tried convincing the probation services the crop was for personal use, but changed his story on the day of sentencing.

His barrister Mr Jakes argued the growing accidentally “got out of hand”.

Prompting the judge to sharply reply: “Come on Mr Jakes, he knew what he was doing he was doing it in waves, it’s a load of nonsense - this is a commercial operation.”

Mitigating, the barrister added Craft cared for his father, suffered anxiety and depression and pleaded guilty to cannabis production and electricity theft at an early opportunity.

But Judge Lowe told Craft, of Church Hill, the scale of the operation was too serious for a prison sentence to be suspended.