California Man Who Kept Runaway Teen In Metal Box At Pot Farm Sentenced To 31 Years In Prison
LAPPL News Watch
July 11, 2019
A 36-year-old Lake County man was sentenced Wednesday to 31 years in prison for his role in illegally growing hundreds of marijuana plants and forcing a runaway teen to work at the farm, sometimes keeping her inside a small metal tool chest.
Ryan Alan Balletto pleaded guilty in December to marijuana trafficking stemming from a May 2013 raid to his property outside of Clear Lake in Lake County, according to the U.S. attorney’s office for the Northern District of California.
At the property, authorities found not only a substantial marijuana growing operation with more than 1,300 plants but also dilapidated trailers where farmers appeared to be living in and a stash of weapons. Investigators compared the scene to the 1972 film “Deliverance.”
"If I was a plant, that's where I'd want to live," David Prince, assistant special agent in charge of Homeland Security investigations in Northern California, said at the time of the raid. "If I was a human, that's not where I'd want to be."
Authorities also found a 15-year-old girl from Los Angeles County who Balletto and another man, Patrick Stephen Pearmain, 31, forced to help them, prosecutors said.
1 comment:
The good times are over for marijuana farmers in Northern California. The market is saturated and the price of weed has plummeted. Former Special Forces Operators were making $10,000 a week protecting the cash. They are gone and the missing person rate has soared. It's not a place to hike in the woods.
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