Hillsborough farmer Clive Weir jailed over ‘large, sophisticated cannabis factory'
A Co Down farmer who admitted allowing a large sophisticated cannabis factory to be built on his land was handed a three year sentence today.
Ordering a shocked-looking Clive Weir to serve half that sentence in jail and half under supervised licence conditions, Judge Donna McColgan KC said while it was clear from reports that the 56-year-old “is extremely anxious about the prospect” of going to jail, given his role and £40,000 profit the custody threshold had been passed.
At an earlier hearing Weir, a father of six from the New Road in Hillsborough, confessed to offences of cultivating cannabis, using criminal property and converting criminal property between February 1 2022 and February 3 2023.
The charges outline that Weir used criminal property, “namely funds in the sum of £184,536.66 for the purchase of fuel from Victor Walker Fuels” and also that he converted criminal property by lodging £41,495 into a Bank of Ireland account and by lodging £132,571.50 into a Clear Bank bank account.
The charges arise following an intelligence-led search operation at Weir’s farm on February 3 last year, and at one stage the defendant contacted the media to criticise the slowness of the police operation.
Summarising the facts of the case during her sentencing remarks yesterday, Judge McColgan outlined that while the search was on February 3, the operation was so large and extensive that it took the police more than a week to dismantle.
The “large, sophisticated cannabis factory” was spread throughout two farm buildings just eight metres from the door to Weir’s home and the judge described how the factory had been split into different rooms for growing cannabis, drying the crop and “rest areas”.
The “sizeable operation” had grow lights, heating and ventilation, all powered by a generator supplied by Weir.
Police seized 700 cannabis plants in various stages of maturity from seedlings to fully mature plants, and the search operation also uncovered 50 kilos of cannabis and two ‘gardeners’, Vietnamese brothers 39-year-old Quy Nguyen and Anh Nguyen, 35, also listed as from the New Road in Hillsborough.
The brothers entered guilty pleas to cultivating cannabis at an earlier hearing.
According to the police case the factory was so extensive it would have produced cannabis worth £200,000 every month, although that profit would have gone to the organisers rather than Weir.
While the defence contend that Weir “never set foot” in any part of the cannabis factory itself, he did buy fuel for the generator which powered the operation.
Weir’s profit, said the judge, was the £41,495 which “represented payments made directly to the defendant by those controlling the cannabis growing operation on his premises”.
Judge McColgan said while the defence do not accept the proposition, the prosecution contend that Weir’s role was “at a level equivalent to that envisaged for a manager” given his physical proximity to the growing operation and that he bought the fuel for the generator.
Turning to defence reports, Judge McColgan said they showed how Weir had depression and anxiety since he was declared bankrupt in 2006 and suggested that at the time of the cannabis seizure, “that he wasn’t thinking straight, he had significant family issues and had somewhat lost focus”.
Earlier defence KC Michael Chambers emphasised that Weir was due substantial credit for his guilty pleas and that he came from a hard working and respectable family.
The judge postponed confiscation proceedings until January 28.