Albanian man locked into cannabis grow dies after fire breaks out

Ermal Qose (35) has died after the building he was locked into to grow Cannabis caught on fire. The Albanian man with no fixed address in the UK spent 2 days in hospital after the fire broke out before he lost his battle to live.

On December 31st officers were called to the scene at 4.10pm by the London Fire Brigade. Ermal was removed to the scene and taken to a nearby hospital. Detective Chief inspector Mark Rogers said “Ermal tragically lost his life having been trapped inside a locked garage which was being used for the cultivation of Cannabis when the fire broke out. My thoughts and sympathies are with his family”.

A 33 year old man was arrested on the 31st of December on suspicion of false imprisonment and cannabis cultivation. He has since been released and on January 7th a 26 year old man was arrested on suspicion of manslaughter , false imprisonment and cannabis cultivation. He remains in custody today.

Detective Mark Rogers said “This is now a manslaughter investigation and although officers have spoken with a number of local people, I want to hear from members of the public who were in the area on New Year’s Eve or who have seen people coming and going from the garage.”

The real people responsible for this are the prohibitionists as they have known for quite sometime of the situation created by cannabis prohibition. A situation where organised crime gangs have been trafficking humans into the UK for the purpose of growing cannabis. Often in these cases its either an Albanian national or a Vietnamese national. The gangs take advantage of young vulnerable people who often speak little to no English, by promising them jobs (like a chef or house maid) and money which they can send home to their families. However once they arrive in the UK they realise they were deceived by the gangs who take their passports and put them to work growing cannabis.

These people are then forced to remain at a house/factory/shed growing cannabis often for months on end. The only interaction they might have with another person is when a gang member shows up to drop off some food supplies. These people wouldn’t dear to run away as they fear for their lives, they don’t even know where they are and they cant speak the local language.

Until Cannabis prohibition is ended we will continue to see people being trafficked by organised crime gangs to grow Cannabis. If Cannabis was regulated then it would be grown by a person protected by employment laws.

Case study: from the University of Cambridge, 34 year old Vietnamese man trafficked to the UK and now in prison for cannabis cultivation

A 34-year-old Vietnamese man now in an English prison for growing cannabis told researchers he had been a taxi driver, before fleeing his home after taking part in protests against a Chinese oil rig in the disputed South China sea.

Accused of betraying his country by police, he entered into contract with a smuggler after fearing for his life when a friend disappeared following arrest. Unable to pay in full, he ended up in debt bondage to a criminal gang.

Believing he was going to the UK to work in kitchens, the grower found himself in a series of lorries and flights across China and Russia, and taken into Europe via the forests of Poland.

“You have to walk for maybe two, three days… I saw one person had been beaten up… when I turned around he was unconscious… he walked too slow,” the grower told researchers. He believed the person he described had died.

The grower arrived in the UK in a lorry container. He was eventually taken to a house already full of cannabis plants and shown how to tend them, and given an allowance for food and phone calls home.

A side by side of working conditions created by Cannabis regulation vs Cannabis Prohibition

“I do not dare leave the house without telling them, because I fear for my life… They told me if I tried to escape they would harm my family,” said the grower.

He remembered police asking some questions about being forced to work, and he had told them. His legal advisor asked no such questions. He did not consider himself a trafficking victim, as he had wanted to come to the UK.

The police interviewer of the grower was a 33-year-old probationary police officer. He had been given an interview plan, and told researchers he viewed the matter in simple terms: “…you’re interviewing him as a suspect to get a confession, or to get the points across to get the conviction or charge…”.

No trafficking questions were in the officer’s plan, but he asked some anyway based on the grower’s response. The officer acknowledged his ignorance of modern slavery legislation to researchers.

A further interview was done by the officer’s supervisor, who was in charge of the investigation. He told researchers the training given to police on slavery – one hour-long session – was insufficient, and until guidance improved they had to rely on instinct.

The officer-in-charge entered a submission to the National Referral Mechanism – the framework set up in 2009 to ensure victims of trafficking receive help. The NRM returned a decision that the grower had “consented” to the illegal work, so was not a victim, and he was sentenced to prison.