A MAN was caught growing 326 cannabis plants worth £145,000 at a funeral home.

Ali Kasa, 27, was arrested after police raided the former Co-op undertakers on Limekiln Road in the Abersychan area of Pontypool.

Prosecutor Tabitha Walker said officers found drugs being cultivated in three separate rooms and that there was also a nursery with 105 baby cannabis plants.

They were capable of producing a combined total of 27kg, Cardiff Crown Court was told.

“The defendant was arrested on March 4 and interviewed on the same day,” Miss Walker added.

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“He explained that his role was to water and fertilise the cannabis plants.

“The defendant said that he had come to the UK in a dinghy from Calais in September 2022.

“He explained that he was trying to pay off a debt from his family who had paid for him to come here and that members of his family had been unwell.

“The defendant added that he had not received any form of payment for the cultivation of the cannabis plants.”

Kasa, of no fixed abode, admitted producing the class B drug.

The Albanian citizen has no previous convictions in the UK.

Jeffrey Jones representing him said his client had worked in construction in his homeland.

“He was promised decent work,” his barrister told the court.

Mr Jones asked that the defendant be given full credit for his early guilty plea.

Judge Richard Kember told Kasa: “You were found in the property and arrested.

“No one else was there and there was no evidence of anyone else living there.

“The electricity was bypassed at the property to allow the growing to take place, but I accept that you were not involved in bypassing the electricity.”

He added: “You said that you were responsible for gardening the plants.

“It was your job to fertilise the plants and you were given instructions on how to do it.

“You were trying to pay off a debt owed by your family.”

Kasa was jailed for 33 weeks and told he would serve half of that sentence in prison.