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Tuesday, June 24, 2003
Luxury items seized from pot growers are auctioned off
SPOKANE -- An auction of luxury goods seized from the homes of upscale marijuana growers netted $403,000 for Spokane police.
Police auctioned off more than 900 items -- ranging from fur coats to Waterford crystal -- seized from homes owned by the members of a marijuana-growing ring. Money from the weekend auction will be used to fight crime.
"We had a lot of people come out to this auction and they treated it like a charity," police Lt. Darrell Toombs said yesterday. "They spent more money because they knew where it was going to go."
Still, there were bargains to be found.
A red Jaguar convertible sold for $27,500. A five-carat diamond ring went for $23,000 and a Russian sable jacket, valued at $110,000, sold for $6,000 at the auction.
Someone spent $200 for a mink jacket specially made for a dog.
The elderly woman who bought the dog's coat wanted her pet Afghan to be warm and look nice even when she didn't have time to comb the animal, Toombs said.
The best deals were in fur coats, Toombs said, which didn't bring in as much money as police hoped.
In contrast, most of the hundreds of pieces of Waterford crystal sold at or above retail values.
Five people were arrested last summer in the marijuana operation that used several large homes in the South Hill neighborhood as "grow houses."
All five pleaded guilty to federal charges and have been sentenced. They agreed to give up their private property as part of their pleas.
Federal authorities seized and sold the homes, worth more than $1 million. Police were allowed to sell the contents.
Kathleen C. Jenny, 59, and her friend, Virginia "Ginger" Erickson, 60, formed a phony interior design company in 1994 and used it as a front to launder money from marijuana growing. Their husbands, Francis Jenny, 65, and Jack Erickson, 67, helped by wiring and plumbing the indoor marijuana operations.
Gregory A. Montgomery, 55, identified as the distributor, pleaded guilty to conspiracy.
The women made regular deposits of thousands of dollars. A bank teller noticed the smell of marijuana on the cash and police were tipped off.
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