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News, West Midlands
NCAThe head of an organised crime group has been convicted of running a network of drug factories capable of producing millions of pounds worth of cannabis.
Roman Le, from Birmingham, operated at least eight farms – and was linked to one inside a former nightclub – before he was arrested and charged with conspiring to produce cannabis, the National Crime Agency (NCA) said.
Posing as a property developer, Le found premises to buy or rent, even erecting scaffolding on some, and used illegal migrants to monitor the crops.
He denied the charge but was found guilty at Birmingham Crown on Thursday. The 37-year-old is due to be sentenced on 4 July.
NCAThe farms were based across the Midlands, North West and north Lincolnshire, the NCA said.
Le worked with two others Yihao Feng, 29, from Manchester, and David Qayumi, 36, from Birmingham, to source and operate the properties, the NCA said.
Feng and Qayumi both later pleaded guilty to conspiring to produce cannabis, the NCA confirmed.
During the NCA’s operation, officers saw Le parking his Bentley Continental outside the former Big Bamboo nightclub in Coventry and heading inside.
The premises was later raided by the NCA and West Midlands Police and 1,500 cannabis plants, worth more than £1m, were growing over three floors.
NCAThree other men were later jailed for running the industrial-scale cannabis farm in the abandoned nightclub.
A former pub in Birmingham and an old hotel in Lancashire were also found to be cannabis farms, the NCA said.
Officers raided the Queen’s Head public house in Farm Street in Hockley and arrested six Albanian nationals who were running the farm and more than 300 plants were seized.
Investigators later found the pub and surrounding land had been sold to a company controlled by Le.
A lock-up storage unit in Aston that had been leased by Qayumi was also raided and officers found equipment used to grow cannabis, lighting units, carbon filters, nutrients, plant pots and grow tents, the NCA said.
NCAAll three men had been seen by officers visiting the unit.
Le, who was arrested at his apartment in Essex Street in Birmingham in November 2020, claimed he was a legitimate businessman who had no knowledge that the properties he had interests in were being used for cannabis grows, detective said.
NCA branch commander Kevin Broadhead said: “Roman Le claimed he was a legitimate property developer, but in actual fact he fronted an organised crime gang capable of producing millions of pounds worth of cannabis.”
He reaped the profits, he added, while the people put to work in them were often exploited migrants who had been smuggled into the UK.
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