Suspiciously High Power Bill Leads to Marijuana Arrests

[FruityBud]

A tipster and a look at a JEA bill has led to 4 arrests for growing marijuana in Atlantic Beach.

Jacksonville Sheriff's Officers arrested 3 adults and a juvenile after finding a garden in a closet Sunday afternoon.

Police say they received a tip that marijuana was being grown at the house at 859 Rudder Rd., and checked the JEA bill, which was several hundred dollars higher than the neighborhood average.

One of the people who lived at that house near Mayport Middle School, James Philpot, was also wanted by police.

According to police, officers knocked on the door, and could already smell marijuana from the porch. The homeowner, James Floyd, answered the door and confirmed there was marijuana in the house.

Police arrested 44-year-old James Floyd, his wife Tara Floyd, 39, and his son James Philpot, 23.

When they searched the house, police saw a closet that had been converted into a grow room, complete with many lights, tin foil-lined walls, and jugs of water.

Police also arrested a juvenile who told police that Philpot bought the marijuana and all of the paraphernalia used for growing and smoking it from the internet. The juvenile said Philpot told him he was tired of buying marijuana, and wanted to grow it himself.

Philpot told police that he was trying to grow a new strand of marijuana, and that the family had smoked most of what he had already grown.

James and Tara Floyd both said similar things to police, and said the family smokes marijuana together.

Police confiscated the marijuana and the things used to help grow it in the closet.

hxxp://tinyurl.com/68b7p2

 

[ishnish]

so now people get arrested for trying to save money in a failing economy?
this is asinine....

 

[trillions of atoms]

well i gotta admire his want to grow a "new strand", but tinfoil?

he needed MJP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Tater]

That an how can a closet grow = a few extra hundred dollars in electricity? I call bull crap.

Edited for cursing, sorry my fingers must have slipped. The letters are like right beside each other lol.

 

[SFC]

Yea, something don't add up.

 

[noneedforalarm]

Yea, something don't add up.

isnt that how it usually is? heh

 

[strawberrycough]

power bill increase from a closet grow.........

maybe if it were a 10x10 closet with lotsa manufactured sun and wind

 

[Motor City Madman]

Thank you my 2 boxes are 4'x4'x4' one has a 400 watt hps and the other has 400 watts of fluorescents and fans in both and it only costs me $35 a month to run the HPS on 12hr and the CFLS on 24hr timer.

 

[eastla_kushsmoka]

people need to live there own lives and not worry about the next person doing what they do it never ends up good for the person that did "the right thing"

 

[omnigr33n]

Whatever the power bill was or was not. They smelled the marijuana from outside, that I suppose was probably cause enough for them to go into the house.

The moronic thing to do was ADMIT to it.

 

[eastla_kushsmoka]

Whatever the power bill was or was not. They smelled the marijuana from outside, that I suppose was probably cause enough for them to go into the house.

The moronic thing to do was ADMIT to it.

he probably already knew he was done ..

 

[Alistair]

The article did say that there were many lights. But still, that would have to be a fairly big closet in order to merit a big bill like that. I imagine that they had many other appliances in their house too.

Personally I get a break on the electricity, because where I live the electric company gives you a break if you qualify for low-income. My bill is only about $35.00 a month, on average. However, I know people on the same plan as me, and they pay about $200.00 a month, and they don't grow. They simply have a lot of appliances, and are careless with their consumption of their utilities.

 

[Tater]

Many lights could mean many CFL's.

 

[Alistair]

True.

 

[SFC]

I like how they mention the proximity to the school. I hate drug warriors.

 

[BuddyLuv]

I run 2 1000w HIDs and my bill is not hundreds of dollars. Even in the dead heat of summer with A/c on full blast and everything running my bill was only 200. Someone snitched and then they looked into ways to gather evidence.

 

[Thorn]

poor family, sounds like they really did just want their own pot oh dear another one nites the dust.. I wonder what 'many lights' they were using and how much the 'high' power bill was? must have be HID lighting surely. Who knows

 

[Fadeux]

well, at 10 cents per kilowatt hour, for a bill of $300.00, that allows 3000 kw/h. To simplify the equivalent, If you were running ONE 1000w HPS, you would need to run it for THREE THOUSAND HOURS to achieve this bill. If you had ten 1000w lights, it would take 300 hours all being lit at the same time. Lets say you had 100 of these 1000w HPS. You would need to run ALL off them at the same time for 30 hours.

Not exact math, but it does make the point that they're lying about this power crap.

 

[whiterussian]

I run 2 1000w HIDs and my bill is not hundreds of dollars. Even in the dead heat of summer with A/c on full blast and everything running my bill was only 200. Someone snitched and then they looked into ways to gather evidence.

Yeah man i got my full set up and we used to run our AC all day too when it was hot but we got a 4 bedroom house and the bill was always 400 even before we were growing, it really only increases your bill about 50 bucks if that

 

[ugmjfarmer]

You guys are all right. The problem is two fold. One, there was probably not enough power being consumed to warant a high power bill knock and talk. Thats most likely hogwash that they printed in order to scare anybody with a closet. This is a publicity case, just so people know that Big Brother still wants to screw you over for hurting nobody.

The second problem, Tinfoil and many lights could mean mylar and many HPS's. We dont know anything because the police are not experts in growing technology and never print what equipment the people used. This is mostly so they dont detail how they caught them, and tell the public how to grow it as well.

The whole problem with these poor peoples defense is that they let them in. The police would have said they had a warrant if they did have one. And the "I smell pot" defense is usually enough to warrant a search regardless.

Tighten your lips people. Buy extra odor protection. And never, never run more than 1) 1000w bulb for each room in your house. I used to have electronic heat and my bills were an easy $250. Think about it.