Jailed for cultivating cannabis plants in house in Dundalk

A Lithuanian man who was caught acting as a 'gardener' in a second growhouse has been jailed at Dundalk Circuit Court for a further 12 months.

Judge Dara Hayes was told 32 year old Sarunas Lubenskas was already serving a sentence for cultivation, following for an offence in May 2018, which he was charged with after his arrest in Dundalk.

The court heard that the defendant was lying on a bed in an upstairs bedroom, when members of the local Garda drugs unit raided an address in Seatown, Dundalk shortly after midday on February 18th 2021.

As soon as they entered the property, they got a strong smell of cannabis and they found 111 mature cannabis plants as well as a number of saplings along with a small amount of cannabis herb.

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Four of the eight of the rooms in the house were converted for cultivation and the electricity metre had been bypassed, causing a hazard.

The total street value of the drugs seized was €89,852.

The married father of two told gardai he had been staying at the address rent-free for five months and another man had a key to the address and called every other day.

He admitted being a habitual user of cannabis and heroin and said he'd been saving for a flight home to his family in Lithuania.

Mr. Lubenskas, who has been in custody since the date of his arrest in Dundalk, had a release date this April, for the sentence over a growhouse uncovered in Drumcondra.

Judge Hayes imposed a consecutive three year sentence, with the final two years suspended on the defendant leaving the jurisdiction within 28 days of his release and not return for five years.