An Albanian drug dealer who was set-up in a £250,000 cannabis farm across two remote Scottish cottages has been jailed for two years.
Renato Kaloti – who has already been banned from Switzerland for heroin trafficking – will be deported back to Albania after arriving in the United Kingdom illegally. Sheriff Alistair Carmichael told the 28-year-old: “As far as I can tell, you have offered nothing positive for Scotland.”
Dundee Sheriff Court was told that Kaloti gave 13,000 Euro to an Albanian drug gang for them to smuggle him into the UK to oversee a large-scale cannabis cultivation. The court heard that he borrowed the money from his mother and expected to be able to pay it back out of his share of the profits from the 309-plant cannabis farm in Angus.
Fiscal depute Joanne Ritchie told the court the illicit cultivation was discovered by a SEPA official who was investigating irregularities in power usage at the adjacent cottages. She said: “He observed a meter bypass and there was a strong smell of cannabis. He contacted police. The accused presented himself at a side door.
“He presented his arms crossed over in front of him and said ‘arrest me, I’m done.’ He invited officers into cottage one where there was a large-scale cannabis cultivation.”
She told the court that a full search was carried out of both cottages at Neuk Farm by Lundie and plants with a potential value of £231,750 were discovered. She added: “He stated to the police that he willingly came to the UK to work for a fellow Albanian male in order to produce cannabis. He purported to have entered the UK illegally.
“He stated he paid 13,000 Euro to gain access to the UK in the back of a truck from Belgium, arriving in London around December 2023. He believed he would be able to make money from work and be able to pay his mother back. In early 2024, he travelled to Edinburgh by train and contacted an Albanian male he did not know. This male and a British man conveyed him to the locus, where the infrastructure was already set up.
“He stated he was inexperienced in cultivation techniques and followed a guide provided to him. He had no knowledge of sales channels or what share his profit would be. He claimed he had been alone for two and a half months and the plants were near maturity. He claimed he did not see the men again but expected them to turn up at some time.”
Ms Ritchie told the court that every room in the two cottages – which had been rented separately by the farmer – had been turned over to growing the drug. Kaloti had previously been jailed in 2020 in Switzerland for being involved in heroin dealing and was banned from that country for a period of seven years.
Solicitor Peter Malone, defending, said: “He entered the UK illegally seeking some sort of work, but when he was unable to find this, he was offered the opportunity to involve himself as a gardener with this cultivation. He will be returned to Albania upon the completion of his sentence. He’s aware there is no other option than to impose a period of imprisonment given the gravity of the offence and his previous convictions.”
Sheriff Carmichael said: “It appears you have entered this country unlawfully with the intention of being involved in illegal drug production. That is unacceptable behaviour. You have no right to enter the country without permission and no right to get involved in the production of illegal drugs. You have already received a prison sentence in Switzerland for a similar crime and were expelled from there.”
The sheriff told Kaloti he would impose a prison sentence upon him in a bid to try and deter others from entering the UK to carry out similar offences. Kaloti, of no fixed abode, admitted being involved in the production of cannabis last April.
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