Jul 29, 2010

Pot farms raided in Calif. wilds are linked to Mexican cartels

06:26 PM

Winding down a three-week sweep of large-scale marijuana-growing on remote public lands, U.S. and California agents have arrested 97 people, most of them Mexican nationals. Several Mexican drug cartels established the pot farms in the Sierra Nevada, officials tell the Associated Press.

Agents have so far destroyed more than 432,000 marijuana plants valued at $1.7 billion. The sweep, through stretches of Fresno, Madera and Tulare counties, ends tomorrow.

"Tremendous devastation has been done and continues to be done by these industrial-sized grows," Gil Kerlikowske, who directs the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, said today in Fresno.

More arrests are planned.

http://content.usatoday.com/communities ... cartels-/1