Taxi driver jailed after cops find £20k cannabis haulA 58-YEAR-OLD taxi driver has been jailed after he grew £20,000 worth of cannabis in a house.
Paul Sims rented a property in Burnham Street, Fenton, which he converted into a cannabis factory.
The defendant was wearing a white boiler suit and trimming the plants when police raided the property on July 28.
Officers found 55 plants which would have had a potential yield of 5.24 kilograms of skunk-type cannabis and a wholesale value of about £20,000.
And they later recovered a safe containing £10,500 from Sims’s home in Buckingham Crescent, Hanford.
Now Sims has been jailed for two-and-a-half years at Stoke-on-Trent Crown Court.
The defendant pleaded guilty to producing cannabis and abstracting electricity.
But his basis of plea – that the operation was set up to support his own habit and a small number of other users – was not accepted and a trial of issue was held.
Recorder Andrew Easteal found against Sims and ruled it was a commercial enterprise.
The judge said: “The defendant contends that the growth was set up by him purely to support his personal use of cannabis.
“He conceded he would have sold a small amount to a very small number of people.
“He denies this was a commercial set-up, designed and intended to generate profit.
“This was clearly a commercial enterprise.
“Police found 55 plants with a potential yield of 5.24 kilograms, on any view a very substantial amount of cannabis.
“They also found a highly sophisticated set up. When the police arrived they found the defendant dressed in overalls, no doubt to prepare cannabis for onward sale and distribution.
“This was a commercial set-up designed for profit.”
Nick Tatlow, defending, conceded Sims was caught red-handed.
He said the defendant was a hard working family man who spent many years working on the rigs and has latterly worked as a taxi driver.
Mr Tatlow said: “He comes across as an unlikely criminal and in many respects an unsophisticated one.
“He did not have any understanding of the serious nature of the charge in which he was involving himself.”
Recorder Andrew Easteal told Sims: “The house was entirely given over to the growing of cannabis.
“You have tried to suggest this was to support your own habit and to supply a few close family members.
“However, your habit cost you £5 to £10 a day, a very modest habit indeed.
“Your’s was a significant role. You are a hard worker.
“The temptation of making a large amount of easy money was simply too great.
“That was a terrible misjudgement on your part.”
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http://www.stokesentinel.co.uk/Taxi-dri ... z3SBN2a6JN
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