Chicago Cops Find Massive Pot Field

Think two football fields of plants worth $10M
By Newser Editors and Wire Services
Posted Oct 3, 2012 4:17 PM CDT
Chicago Cops Find Massive Pot Field
Chicago police officers enter an area where authorities are busy chopping down 6-to-8-foot tall marijuana plants on the South Side.   (Teresa Crawford)

In Chicago, where skyscrapers are as likely to sprout up as anything a farmer might plant, someone decided there was just enough room to grow something a little more organic: Marijuana. Just days before the crop on a chunk of land the size of two football fields would have been ready to harvest, a police officer and county sheriff's deputy in a helicopter spotted it as they headed back to their hangar about three miles away.

Today, a day after the discovery of the largest marijuana farm anyone at the police department can remember, officers became farmers for a day as they began to chop down about 1,500 marijuana plants that police said could have earned the growers as much as $10 million. No arrests had been made, and police were still trying to determine who owns the property that housed the grow site on the city's far South Side. But police said they were hopeful that because of the size of the operation, informants might provide tips about those involved, including a man seen running from the area as the helicopter swooped low. (More marijuana stories.)

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