Article published Dec 21, 2007



Officials raided this property, at 3777 Hidden River Road. They found the home and an airplane hangar converted to grow houses.

By TODD RUGER




SARASOTA COUNTY -- Deputies raided two marijuana grow houses this week in rural homes east of Interstate 75 that authorities say are connected to a Cuban drug ring based in the Miami area.

The Sarasota County Sheriff's Office has busted 18 grow houses with Cuban homeowners or tenants in North Port since April, and say this week's busts have another key similarity.

"They're looking for areas that offer some seclusion," said Capt. Jeff Bell of the Sheriff's Office.

In North Port and some Charlotte and Lee county cities, that meant renting or buying vacant homes in areas where the sagging housing market meant lower overhead costs and fewer neighbors.

This week's busts netted about 700 marijuana plants -- about 200 mature enough for harvest -- from homes in neighborhoods where houses have plenty of distance from each other.

Deputies on Tuesday raided 6570 Old Ranch Road in the Myakka Valley Ranches neighborhood, a 5-acre property where deputies found 600 plants in a barn converted to a grow house.

Another barn was in the process of being converted to a grow house. The house was purchased in November 2006 for $550,000.

The men at the property had told the neighborhood association they were starting a dog breeding business, Bell said.

Like many of the busts, neighbors reported suspicious activity, including no trash pick-up and the sounds of construction at the property, and detectives conducted months of surveillance, Bell said.

No arrests were made at the raid, but the men at that house had been seen going to and from 3777 Hidden River Road, an 11-acre property in a neighborhood with a private air strip, Bell said.

The house was purchased in February for $680,000, which was $100,000 more than it sold for two years earlier.

Deputies raided the Hidden River Road property Wednesday night and found both the inside of the home and an airplane hangar had been converted to grow houses, Bell said. There were about 80 plants in the hangar.

The occupants of the home had prematurely harvested about 80 plants growing in the master bedroom and bathroom, and Bell said he thinks they knew about the previous night's raid.

Arrested at the Hidden River Road home were two Cubans, Hector Diaz, 48 and Oreste Cordero-Garcia, 42, who told deputies he is a self-employed farmer.

They face charges of trafficking in cannabis, cultivating marijuana and manufacturing drug paraphernalia.

All of the grow houses discovered by authorities in Sarasota County had either a property owner, grower or tenant related to Cuba and a "fingerprint" of the sometimes sophisticated handiwork needed to steal electricity, Bell said.

Detectives are still investigating the latest grow houses, searching for other possible crimes connected to purchasing the property or financing the operation, he said.