Police uncover married couple’s marijuana grow house during search for probationer
Glendale police seized more than 200 marijuana plants from a Sun Valley home during a probation compliance check last week that led to three arrests, police said.
A married couple and their cousin were arrested on suspicion of drug sales and fraud. However, police weren’t looking for the trio.
Glendale’s AB 109 Task Force — created three years ago to address the local impact of the state’s criminal realignment law — supervises anywhere from 40 to 50 Glendale residents on post-release community supervision.
However, the task force, which includes officers from Glendale and Burbank, also keeps its eye on probationers and parolees who come through the city.
That’s how Andrey Arutyunyan made it on the team’s radar.
Arutyunyan, who police identified as a known gang member on probation, was cited in Glendale last August after patrol officers approached him for a smoking violation and discovered that he had a loaded syringe in his pocket, according to Glendale Police Sgt. Robert Rosas, who supervises the task force.
“That’s what prompts our unit to go out and conduct a compliance check,” Rosas said. “What we’ve found is a lot of different crimes that occur in the city are [by] individuals living outside of the area.”
But the task force didn’t find Arutyunyan at the Sun Valley home. Authorities later discovered that he’d been evicted in June and is actually in jail in Missouri, where his family had reportedly sent him for drug treatment, on a pending assault charge.
Instead, officers uncovered an “elaborate” marijuana farm in a converted garage, leading them to seize more than 200 marijuana plants, 5 pounds of packaged marijuana, two loaded guns, cash and packaging materials, according to Glendale Police spokeswoman Tahnee Lightfoot.
Los Angeles utility officials cut the power in the home due to illegal electrical work and a $4,000 unpaid electric bill.
The residents — married couple Michael, 28, and Marine Petrosian, 24 — were arrested on suspicion of cultivating marijuana. Michael Petrosian, who reportedly told police the operation was legal, was also booked on suspicion of possessing marijuana for sale.
The couple told police they did not know Arutyunyan, but police reportedly found mail addressed to Arutyunyan in Michael Petrosian’s car.
Meanwhile, Michael Petrosian’s cousin Armen Simonyan, a 27-year-old North Hollywood resident, showed up while police were at the home, Rosas said. He was arrested on suspicion of credit- and debit-card fraud after police reportedly found him in possession of fraudulent identification and credit cards.
The trio was released from police custody after posting bail.
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Alene Tchekmedyian, alene.tchekmedyian@latimes.com
Twitter: @atchek
