A LITHUANIAN drug dealer who illegally wired up his Newport flat with electricity to grow a “substantial cannabis crop” was jailed.

By night Lukas Keitis worked in a Tesco warehouse but by day he cultivated a 3.2kg crop worth nearly £13,000 in Pill.

Prosecutor Andrew Davies told Newport Crown Court how a drugs raid uncovered the criminal enterprise in his Clarence Street home on September 28, 2018.

As well as finding the cannabis plants, police also unearthed weighing scales and “smell-proof bags”, Judge Michael Fitton QC heard.

Keitis, who followed proceedings through an interpreter, pleaded guilty to producing cannabis, possessing cannabis with intent to supply and abstracting electricity.

The offences were committed between September 1 and September 28, 2018.

Mr Davies said the 20-year-old’s only other previous conviction was for a motoring offence last year.

Sarah Iles, mitigating, said Keitis’ parents had left Lithuania to come to the United Kingdom to live when the defendant was only eight years old.

She said he had been placed in care in his homeland after their departure and had come to this country two years ago where he found them living in Gloucester.

The court heard how he had moved in with them before settling in Newport five months ago.

Ms Iles said her client had told her he would return to live with his parents in the West Country after serving his sentence.

Judge Fitton told Keitis he had been involved in a “moderately sophisticated set-up”.

He added: “The likelihood is that there is more to this enterprise than you have been willing to tell the police.”

The judge said he had been responsible for a “substantial crop”.

Keitis was jailed for a total of 15 months.

The court ordered the forfeiture and destruction of the drugs as well as all the equipment and paraphernalia the defendant had used.

There was no application made under the Proceeds of Crime Act against Keitis.