>For hours at a time, the Michigan State Police take to the air to get a unique perspective looking into areas where homeowners may be breaking the law when it comes to growing marijuana.<
>Helicopter pilot Lieutenant Patrick Lawrence located the plants and then radioed the Tri-County Metro Narcotics Squad officers on the ground.<
LANSING, MI (WLNS) - The Tri-County Metro Narcotics Squad teamed up with the Michigan State Police aviation unit Friday on a mission to rid the area of marijuana growing illegally.
Our Sheri Jones, and Chief Photographer David Parks went along for an exclusive "birds eye" view.
For hours at a time, the Michigan State Police take to the air to get a unique perspective looking into areas where homeowners may be breaking the law when it comes to growing marijuana.
From 500 feet in the air they spotted four growing operations within a 1/4 of a mile of each other in rural Eaton County.
Helicopter pilot Lieutenant Patrick Lawrence located the plants and then radioed the Tri-County Metro Narcotics Squad officers on the ground.
It's their job to make sure the owners are following the law and in this case they are all were.
That wasn't the case though for this homeowner in Vermontville. The eight plants he had growing in his backyard were seized.
From there, the team headed south to a swampy area, where metro officers armed with machetes cut their way through the brush and ultimately to the illegal pot plants growing wild there. It was quite a shock to the landowner.
“If they can keep drugs out of the hands of kids, I'm all for it,” said Dennis Warner, property owner.
The plants are all tagged and brought in as evidence. They'll be added to the 30,000 plants seized this summer in Michigan and the growing season isn't over yet. One recent fly-over by Michigan State Police yielded 15,000 plants.
“It's a cartel grow, so we're getting cartel moving up from the southwest border into our state. Weapons were found out in the grow and they build a camp and they move people, sometimes illegal immigrants actually live out there and take care of the grow for them. With that comes violence that we're seeing along the border currently. That's what we don't want in our state,” said First Lt. Chris Bush, Michigan State Police Field Support and Aviation Section Commander.
Watch the video above for more from 6 News Sheri Jones.
http://www.wlns.com/...rijuana-growing
SHERI JONES WITH MSP
Aug 8, 2014
6 News Exclusive: Sheri Jones Joins MSP To Eliminate Illegal Marijuana Growing
6 News Exclusive: Sheri Jones Joins MSP To Eliminate Illegal Marijuana Growing
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- 6 News Exclusive: Sheri Jones Joins MSP To Eliminate Illegal Marijuana Growing
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Clyde La Fave
5 hours ago
+1
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HUGE waste of taxpayers money !! Get outta the chopper and hit the streets where the REAL crime is !
Wayne Koper
10 hours ago
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I can't think of one thing more important to expend Michigan tax revenue on, not a single thing. OK maybe a raise for Snyder and the Republican leadership.
Brad Forrester
10 hours ago
+2
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Another gigantic waste of public resources!!! The MSP only solves 1 in 4 murders but they can afford to break out the chopper to bust people for cannabis. Enjoy it while you can Sheri because in 2016, the voters are going to shut you down!!!
Bonney70
11 hours ago
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This is the big news of of the tri-county area? A regular guy, growing his own pot? A father and husband, a working man? Really? This is the best you got? What about the massive amounts of heroin entering into our school districts every day? Marijuana is legal. The big drug with teens is heroin! What a joke. Everyone involved should look in the mirror and ask themselves; is this the most bang for the buck for our citizens? They should all resign. Share with the public what their priorties are. A dude growing some pot in his garden or heroin in our school districts? Cartel grow? What ****! This is an easy bust. chlorophyl from marijuanna is easily picked out from that of other plants. What a publicity stunt! God Bless you idiots! For the record, I don't smoke pot.
I dig the comments from facebook^^^^^
I think this guys comment summed it up nicely-----
Harassment.
"All these people that we harassed today were following the law, but this one time there was a guy in Vermontville, and he had 8 plants he didn't even know about! This is why we need a helicopter and thousands of dedicated man-hours for marijuana eradication. To keep the people safe."
I've read a lot of scary legal documents produced up there over the past few months. I would not be surprised to see a SWAT team raid and seize with a "cease and desist order" or a legal opinion on letterhead from and signed by your local Prosecuting Attorney (Tony Badovinac). I suggest you head south away from those cowboys 
At least down here they solicit a Federal Agent to go before a Federal Court to avoid/ignore the reality of our MMMA Section 4 protections ...
$$
They sure made a bunch of headlines all across the state and I 94 in particular last year. Remember the GrowGreen's raid and seizure of business records in Spring and the dozens of raids that followed all year long. All those "IEDs" they seized along with everything else in Jackson, the home explosion in Ypsi with a warrant to raid along with dozens of others only a day later, those 27 on the west side of the state raided, arrested, indicted and then all charges dropped all within days ...