Suspected blackmarket pot grows raided by feds
Agents target dozens of homes in posh Aurora neighborhood; Arapahoe County DA says raids hit single criminal operation
Federal and local agents fanned out across the Aurora area Wednesday morning, targeting a posh neighborhood as they executed more than two dozen warrants to search suspected illegal marijuana grow houses.
At these homes, largely in the Tollgate Crossing subdivision near Aurora’s Cherokee Trail High School, agents could be seen carrying hun dreds of marijuana plants outside, lining them up in neat rows across driveways and front lawns. Hundreds of local, state and federal officers, including agents from the Drug Enforcement Administration, hit at least 24 homes during Wednesday’s raids, which Arapahoe County District Attorney George Brauchler said were centered on a single criminal operation.
“They are related to a blackmarket marijuana operation,” DEA spokesman Randy Ladd said. Tollgate Crossing is “a very affluent neighborhood. Houses there sell for $500,000 to $600,000.”
Ladd declined to say how many total warrants were served. Wednesday afternoon, DEA agents executed multiple additional warrants in the Conservatory neighborhood of Aurora, he confirmed.
No arrests have been made related to the grow operations, officials said.
Mary Johnson lives three doors down from one of the houses raided Wednesday morning. She said she had no idea homes were being used for illegal marijuana grows in Tollgate Crossing.
“It’s a little concerning because who knows what kinds of people this is bringing into the neighborhood,” she said.
A quick drive through the snowy Tollgate Crossing subdivision Wednesday morning revealed DEA agents lining up hundreds of marijuana plants across the lawns of several homes. Agents seized 256 plants from one house on Haleyville Street, a DEA official said. Another house in the neighborhood had more than twice that amount, said the agent, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to reveal the numbers of plants seized.
According to Ladd, “people don’t live in these homes. They bought them solely to run marijuana operations. It’s a large operation, but the size of this operation is becoming more and more common.”
But one neighbor on Haleyville Street, who would not disclose her name, said she knows a family with two younger children that lives in one of the raided homes.
“The kids stood out front this morning and watched this all happen,” she said. “They might not know what was going on exactly, but they knew it wasn’t good.”
“It’s sad,” she continued. “That was a family.”
Carlos Gonzalez walked out to his sidewalk to see all the commotion on his block. He said he’d never seen anything like this in his neighborhood, but it’s not terribly surprising given Colorado’s reputation as a marijuana haven.
“Still, I have two kids,” Gonzalez said. “There are many kids in the neighbor hood. Weird people can show up to the neighborhood if this stuff is going on.”
Others in Tollgate Crossing were not fazed by the rash of apparent grow houses found in the subdivision.
“This isn’t too surprising,” Pete Holub said. “It’s just pot. This is nothing new.”
Hardy Jones, who just moved in across the street from one of the raided homes, said when he saw a UHaul and several cars in front of his house Wednesday morning, he thought someone was moving out.
“I said, ‘Look at all these people helping this guy move; that’s nice of them,’ ” Jones said with a chuckle.
He said that while it was “hard to take in” that his neighbors ran a largescale grow house, he wasn’t concerned.
“I’m exmilitary,” Jones said. “It’s more interesting than worrying.”
Ladd, the DEA spokesman, alleged that blackmarket pot operations have brought many other illegal activities to Colorado, increasing the numbers of murders, robberies and gun sales.
“We find guns at almost all illegal grow operations,” he said. “A lot of the blackmarket traffickers are polydrug operations that sell cocaine, methamphetamine, opioids and heroin.”
Brauchler, who is running for Colorado attorney general, said he’s seen 11 firstdegree murder cases in the district related to blackmarket marijuana transactions since the state first legalized recreational marijuana nearly five years ago.
“We have seen a huge surge in blackmarket marijuana busts,” he said. “And in the past you could expect blackmarket marijuana to be a lower potency, lower grade, lower quality. … We’re talking about significant grows. And this stuff is going to be diverted outside the state of Colorado to places that don’t have a regulated marijuana market. And that’s us being bad neighbors.”
Two weeks ago, U.S. Attorney Bob Troyer predicted that he would target illegal grow operations disguised as legal marijuana grow houses as part of a new strategy in the drug war.
Troyer said his decision to focus on licensed marijuana dispensaries and grow houses in Denver metro neighborhoods is driven in part by poorly written and enforced Colorado laws that have caused the blackmarket drug trade in this state to boom and contribute to a spike in violent crime.
Going back to when Colorado’s recreational marijuana law was passed in 2012, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Denver along with state and federal drug task forces largely targeted illegal marijuana grows making no attempt to follow state laws. Most of them had operated in remote Western Slope counties. Colorado, local and federal agents and prosecutors reported great success, making dozens of arrests and seizing 7.3 tons of marijuana.
Ladd said that just since 2014, law enforcement officers in Colorado have raided 300 blackmarket marijuana grow houses and seized 70,000 marijuana plants weighing 10,000 pounds.
“It’s going to go up today,” said Ladd, referring to the number of marijuana plants seized. “We have seen a significant increase in blackmarket marijuana activity. It’s millions and millions of dollars.”