Jail for cannabis trio with £1.8m farm in old shopping centre

THREE men who ran a massive cannabis farm in a derelict Scottish shopping centre have been jailed.

- By Grant McCabe

After they were sentenced it emerged two of the trio, all Albanians, had previously been ordered to be deported from the UK.

One had been deported but managed to return to the UK undetected.

Elton Skenderi, Gjovalin Toma and Eduard Daja were sentenced yesterday at the High Court in Glasgow.

They had admitted being involved in production of the Class-B drug.

Thousands of plants were seized in a raid in Ayrshire last September.

Skenderi, 30, was locked up for five years and three months. Toma, 31, was jailed for six years. Daja, 39, was handed six years and nine months by judge Lord Mulholland.

The cannabis factory was set up in shuttered units at the former Forum Shopping Centre in Irvine. Police had been tipped off by ScottishPower who had concerns about energy use at the premises.

Prosecutor Stewart Ronnie: "Entry was forced and a large cannabis cultivation was discovered over two floors."