Must be the season for big drug busts

First Operation Ironside and now this.
Got a very large Mexican Cartel operation near Los Angeles - from LA Station KTLA:

Deputies plan to bulldoze 500 illegal marijuana grows in Antelope Valley after massive bust
Authorities seized tens of millions of dollars worth of illegal marijuana grown in the high desert Tuesday as part of an effort to curtail the black market’s grip on Southern California.

Twenty-three people were arrested in the crackdown Tuesday in the Antelope Valley, 70 miles north of Los Angeles, and officials planned to bulldoze 500 illegal grows in the area over the coming days.

So-called recreational marijuana became legal in California in 2018, but the black market continues to flourish.

They could have continued flying under the radar but they got greedy:

Villanueva did not have an immediate count of the amount of marijuana seized Tuesday, but he said officials were measuring it by the tons. Lancaster Mayor R. Rex Parris said Tuesday’s operation had found $380 million worth of infrastructure and marijuana in the area.

Unspecified cartels operating the illegal marijuana grows were stealing millions of gallons of water, the sheriff said. Armed cartel members were taking from wells maintained by alfalfa, potato and carrot farmers in the middle of the night, as well as breaking fire hydrants and operating their own illegal wells.

Villanueva said the illegal grows breed violence, citing several murders related to the Antelope Valley’s black market. In April, a robbery at a cultivation site resulted in a shootout.

Best and brightest. A stirling example of open borders and what they bring us.