The cannabis camp that cost YOU £3m
Public money lavished on travellers’ site where residents built £340k drug farm in their caravans
A TRAVELLERS’ camp built with £3million of taxpayers’ cash was turned into a ‘highly lucrative’ cannabis farm.
Half of the 24 caravans at the newly-renovated camp were being used as cover for the ‘sophisticated’ drugs plantation worth up to £340,000, a court heard.
Ten men – eight of them residents at the South Wales camp – are facing prison after confessing to growing hundreds of the plants.
But four others were cleared after the businessman owner of the Glynmill Gypsy and Traveller Site in Merthyr Tydfil refused to give evidence.
The site benefited from a £3million grant for improvements, including a community hall, toilet blocks and landscaping, from the Welsh Labour Government.
A huge police raid involving 100 officers, riot police and horses, uncovered the plantation last year. Police seized 453 plants from 12 of the 24 plots on the site, home for up to 120 people.
Prosecutor Ieuan Morris said: ‘ This was an organised group involved in the production of cannabis worth between £90,000 and £340,000. In the raid on the three-acre site in February last year they discovered cannabis plants being grown with sophisticated hydroponic systems.
‘Cannabis plants of various stages of growth were recovered as was the paraphernalia associated with large-scale production. This was a joint enterprise, each playing a part and each knowing the nature of the operation.’
Some travellers were paying the site manager up to £40 a day in electricity tokens to power the plantation, Merthyr Tydfil Crown Court heard.
Andrew Jakes, 36, Adam Jones, 23, Barry Jones, 34, Brinnie Mochan,18, Peter Gilheaney, 18, Steven Francis Gilheaney, 33, Martin Gilheaney, 27, and Peter Patrick Gilheaney, 27, all of Glynmill Caravan Site, admitted conspiracy to produce cannabis and cannabis production.
Edward Probert, 27, of Pontypool, Gwent, and William Henry Williams, 20, of Merthyr Tydfil, admitted the same charges.
But another four living at the site were cleared when camp owner Craig William Bennett refused to take the stand in court after being called as a witness.
Father- of- four Bennett was awarded the £3million in three grants between 2011 and 2014 to improve the camp.
He then rented the site back to the local council, which provided the camp for the travellers.
After the case against the four residents collapsed, Bennett was prosecuted for contempt of court and fined £500 on Friday.
He told the court: ‘I had no idea what was going on. I had never smelled cannabis. I had an accident seven years ago and can’t smell anything. I would not know what it smelled like anyway.’
Among the four people cleared was £450-a-week site manager William Gilheaney, 51, who claimed he had no idea about the drug-growing operation.
The ten defendants who pleaded guilty will be sentenced at a later date. A Welsh Government spokesman said: ‘It would not be appropriate to comment while the case is proceeding.’