PORTER, Okla. — The Oklahoma Attorney General's Office recently took down more than 72,000 pounds of marijuana at an illegal grow farm in Wagoner County. It's one of many success stories for the newly formed Organized Crime Task Force.
When people think of Porter, Okla., peaches typically come to mind, not the state's largest seizure of black-market marijuana.
The Wagoner County Sheriff's Office posted a video of themselves, the Oklahoma Medical Marijuana Authority, Homeland Security, and other county officials clearing out weed with a bulldozer and leaving a metal barn empty on Nov. 9. It's located on a sod farm.
It is close to where Ron Amstrong works.
"I'm glad they're out there kind of monitoring it," Armstrong said.
The recent siege may have been the largest in state history, but taking down illegal grow operations has been top of mine for Attorney General Gentner Drummond since he took office.
When medicinal marijuana laws passed in Oklahoma in 2018, he says the state had about 12,000 grow operations. Now they're down to 6,000. That's in large part to the Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics, Oklahoma Medical Marijuana Authority, and his agency's newly formed Organized Crime Task Force, shutting down illegal grows.
He says the illegal grows are run mainly by Chinese and Mexican cartels illegally entering Oklahoma.
"We're not just killing one snake at a time. Now what we're doing -we're finding out the syndication," Drummond said. "In partnership with other federal agencies and state agencies, we will take out the bad actors 10, 14, 20 at a time."
If you suspect an illegal grow operation near you, submit a tip to the Oklahoma Attorney General's Office. You can remain anonymous.
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