A REMOTE house in the countryside near St Dogmaels was turned into a cannabis factory capable of producing drugs worth £229,000, a judge heard.

Police armed with a search warrant broke into the detached property on 21 January and found an illegal immigrant tending to 273 mature cannabis plants and 161 saplings.

Dean Pulling, prosecuting, told Swansea Crown Court that four rooms had been converted to rear cannabis plants.

Powerful lamps had been installed along with transformers, fans, air filtration systems and other sophisticated equipment.

And the electricity meter had been bypassed to avoid giving away how much power was being consumed and to avoid paying for it.

Mr Pulling said the three-storey-high property appeared to be empty of people, but in the basement officers found Hoang Thai, a 22-year-old immigrant from Vietnam who had been smuggled into the UK via Russia, northern Europe and Calais.

Thai admitted producing cannabis and was jailed for 20 months.

Mr Pulling said the plants recovered by the police could have produced cannabis with a street value of between £76,440 and £229,320.

Huw Rees, representing Thai, said he hoped to make money to send back to his impoverished parents­.

He had been offered work by someone he knew as “Western Man” and was told he would be growing tomatoes.

He soon realised they were not tomato plants, but had not known they were cannabis.