Jail for dad over role in marijuana cultivation in St Albans

A father of two has been jailed for nine months for his limited role in the cultivation of 346 marijuana plants at a St Albans house.

Tuan Minh Pham pled guilty to one charge of the cultivation of a commercial quantity of plants weighing 167.35 kilograms.

The County Court heard the 35-year-old had been recruited for the operation in a “limited way” to eliminate a “moderate” personal debt.

On September 13 last year after just three hours of surveillance police went to the Power Street property and found an elaborate hydroponic equipment including closed circuit television and 346 plants, a commercial quantity of 25 kilograms.

“That, in anybody’s language, is a lot,” Justice Smallwood said in sentencing Pham on April 1.

“If it was not a commercial quantity, you would probably not go to jail at all, but the fact of the matter is, Mr Pham, it is a lot of cannabis.”

Pham had already been in jail for 196 days before sentencing.