Ventura County Sheriff’s Department narcotics detectives say it was a huge year for raids on large scale illegal marijuana operations in the county, with more than half a billion dollars in plants seized.
County investigators working with state and federal law enforcement officers confiscated 130,000 marijuana plants during the last five months in the Los Padres National Forest.
The number of plants seized is up by about 28,000 plants since 2016.
They also found elaborate irrigation systems, campsites, and in some cases guns. The confiscated plants had a street value of $585,000,000.