Marijuana haul yields 3 arrests
Three San Gabriel residents were arrested after authorities found more than 1,000 marijuana plants and cultivating equipment in three rental houses, police said.
Henry Kwong, 22, Yue Huan Mai, 25, and Denise Guan, 32, were arrested late Thursday on suspicion of cultivating marijuana, said El Monte Police Det. Ralph Batres.
El Monte police received tips from neighbors that a house in the 2800 block of Maxson Road -- inside the gated Maxson Villas complex -- was being used to grow marijuana, Batres said. When detectives knocked on the front door, Kwong and Mai answered and allowed them to search the house, Batres said. Some marijuana plants were discovered stashed upstairs, he said.
After arresting the two men, detectives followed leads to a second house in Walnut and a third in San Gabriel, where they arrested Guan, Batres said.
Batres said that the El Monte rental home was wired to siphon electricity to power the marijuana-growing operation, and that the plants in that house and the one in San Gabriel were worth about $1 million.
Batres said investigators did not believe the operation was gang-related or connected to other extensive growing operations that have been uncovered in suburban homes in recent years.
-- Molly Hennessy-Fiske
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