UTV Ireland Staff, Dublin
To Duc Tien, 32, said he was controlled by Vietnamese criminals to whom he had paid $27,000 to be smuggled into Ireland.
Details emerged as the 32-year-old was granted bail on charges linked to the seizure of £275,000 worth of drugs from a house in Mullaghbawn, Co Armagh in Ireland.
In this Dec. 31, 2013 file photo, employees tends to marijuana plants at a grow house in Denver. In Ireland, a man is on trial after being arrested in a raid at a factory. (AP Photo/Brennan Linsley, file)
Tien, of no fixed address, is accused of importing, cultivating, possessing and conspiracy to supply cannabis.
He faces further counts of using electricity and causing it to be diverted. The Vietnamese national was arrested during a raid on the property in April last year. Police swooped as part of a wider operation against an international drugs smuggling racket.
That investigation, in partnership with the National Crime Agency and Italian Carabinieri police, has also led to arrests and seizures in Italy. Prosecution counsel Kate McKay said three rooms in the house had been turned into a cannabis factory, with 530 plants recovered.
“This applicant was in the kitchen and said he was an illegal immigrant controlled by a Vietnamese crime gang,” McKay told the court. “He said he had been charged $27,000 to be smuggled into Dublin to work.”
The accused claimed his passport was taken from him before he was handed over to a Chinese man who took him to the house.
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