By Jeff Lipton
Armed with a search warrant, about a dozen police from the Nassau County Narcotics Bureau, joined by agents from the Long Island Drug Enforcement Agency Task Force, swooped down on the warehouse at 40A Hempstead Garden Drive, authorities said. The raid on the warehouse was carried out at 9:55 p.m. on Wednesday, Feb. 13, police said.
The Cedarhurst man was identified as Evan Seplow, 23, of Peninsula Boulevard, police said.
The other suspects were identified as Salvatore Misuraca, 24, of Grange Street, Franklin Square; Jason Main, 22, of Langley Avenue, West Hempstead; Daniel Burke, 22, of Concord Avenue, West Hempstead; Robert Hulsart, 24, of Van Cott Avenue, Farmingdale; Anthony Wein, 26, of Stuyvesant Avenue, Setauket; Andrew Scott Buchman, 22, of North Wyoming Avenue, North Massapequa; and Steven Frigand, 36, of Court North Drive, Melville, police said.
All eight were charged with criminal possession of marijuana in the first degree, a C felony. They were arraigned separately in First District Court in Hempstead on Thursday, Feb. 14.
During the raid, police confiscated 10 pounds of marijuana, including more than 100 growing and harvested marijuana plants, officials said. In addition, they seized the equipment used to grow the plants, including assorted lights, heaters, and paraphernalia used to convert the building into a hydroponic marijuana growing factory, according to the Narcotics Bureau. Also seized during the raid was a .38-caliber revolver, police said. But no one has yet been charged with possession of the weapon, officials said.
The recovered marijuana has an estimated street value of more than $500,000, detectives said.
The plant is called hydroponic because the suspects used water, chemicals and fertilizer, instead of soil, to grow the plants indoors, said Lt. John Wolff of the Narcotics Bureau.
Wolff said the building has been leased at the West Hempstead location since May 2001, so investigators believe the marijuana-producing operation has been in existence at least since then. It is not known how long the entire operation has been producing marijuana plants, Wolff said.
When police surrounded the warehouse on Feb. 13, the eight suspects were in the process of trimming the plants during the harvesting process, Wolff said.
It appears that they all had a vested interest in the operation, said Wolff.
He described the marijuana warehouse as a fairly sophisticated operation. There were in excess of 100 growing plants. What it does is allow people to use grow lights to allow them to grow the plants indoors, said Wolff, who added that this type of operation is harder to detect than an outdoor marijuana-growing operation.
Investigators could not immediately say to what extent the marijuana was being distributed, but added that much of it probably made its way to the streets of Nassau County. I
