Who says crime doesn't pay?

My brother in law is a senior police officer with Hertfordshire Constabulary, we had a chat yesterday and the subject of cannibis farms cropped up......

Did you know all illegal cannibis farm equipment gets smashed and skipped?

Hopefully some will be coming my way, I supply my sister and bro in law with veggie plants and he's going to try and re-direct some seized lighting, heating and fans in my direction.

Must point out, I DON'T do drugs of any description apart from the odd paracetamol and then reluctantly!

 

Does seem a waste, especially when everyone is struggling to make ends meet.

You'd think they'd be auctioning the stuff off rather than destroying it and sending it to landfill.

 

Most of it would immediately be put back to loft-farming wouldn't it ?

 

I'm assuming that what he's doing is legal? Can't have coppers breaking the law can we?

 

Cars etc are auctioned off, stuff seized via the Proceeds Of Crime. Some forces have eBay accounts! (Leicestershire definitely have a page there ) I guess this specific equipment was to be destroyed as it could be used for a criminal purpose, even though it could easily be used for a good purpose.

 

Back in the early days of EBay police auctions were a good source of cheap stuff - I had a really rather posh Smeg oven that was about 1/5th the retail price & just needed a clean up to the get the fingerprint powder off.. and I still have a stash of old cotton sheets from Devizes Prison in the garage, hugely useful for wrapping things up & making hedgehog nests. They did wash them before selling them...

Sadly getting any sort of bargain on EBay nowadays is difficult, although I have picked up some cheap cannon FD camera lenses to play with on my Sony NEX .

 

Sadly I couldn't afford the flash-Harry supercar that was on there about a year ago!

 

I haven't been to many auctions, but at the big one at Thirsk, you have to register to get your bidding number. They want your name, address and bank details so they can bill you if you win an auction then run away. It would of course be a violation of the Data Protection Act if that data was to be used for any other purpose, such as for example, keeping a record of where a particular lot went, but it would be difficult to prove.

 

Yes.

BTW, those fans can be mahoosive

PS: Also, don't forget to ask for any pumps ... may be useful with your water butts

 

I did wonder about that part. A commercial nursery that lights its crops maybe, but I doubt any amateur would want them - I reckon that the cannabis farms mostly use 1kW Metal Halide lights, and bypass the electric meters to be able to "afford" the electricity ... everything else will be on the "hefty" scale. Most amateurs are looking to LEDs and the like to reduce the power consumption they require.

 

They raided a small cannabis farm near here a few weeks ago. They confiscated 24 plants with a street value of £16,000 , is each plant worth around £700 !!! or are the police trying to up their crime figures ?

 

I think they go on how much each plant is likely to yield, and work out the street value of the end product