GREAT MAINS ROBBERY

Hi-vis workers dug up pavements from Dundee to Portsmouth to channel power for hash farms

- 

AN ORGANISED drugs gang teamed up with dodgy workmen to protect £21million cannabis operation that stretched from Dundee to Portsmouth.

Eight men from England have been jailed for 28 years for their involvement in the scheme that saw electricity supplies diverted to 100 cannabis farms.

The operation, by company Elev8 spanned 32 police force areas, including Dundee although no specific details of their Scottish operations were released.

The Wigan and Liverpool-based company had criminals wearing hi-vis clothing dig up roads to divert power supplies to houses, warehouses and disused shops that were being used to store cannabis farms.

The investigation began in January 2023 when North Wales Police received intelligence from residents in Bangor about suspicious activity at a long-abandoned shop on the high street, which led to the seizure of cannabis cultivations worth approximately £1.2million. In the months that followed, additional warrants were carried out at other empty properties on Bangor High Street, leading to the recovery of a further £800,000 worth of cannabis plants.