Neighbours catch drugs farmer as he flees Black Country cannabis farm

Thuy Huang, originally from Vietnam, was nabbed by residents as he was fleeing from the premises in Northgate, Cradley Heath, where police later found 252 cannabis plants growing.

Rita Bills, who has lived in the road for more than 35 years, said she had felt something wasn't right in the four-bedroom house since March.

She said: "Just before Easter we believed someone had moved in, but it was odd that we were seeing no one coming or going.

"A couple of weeks later I thought I could smell something odd.

"The most frightening thing was that something didn't feel right and I had a suspicion that someone wasn't really living there.

"When the landlord came one Sunday afternoon he said he was going to phone the police and that's when we could hear noises from the back gate.

"My son, Daniel, along with another neighbour went over the wall and caught the man trying to leave out the back door.

"He said to him 'go back in mate the police are on their way'.

"We waited at the bottom of the entry to make sure he didn't get out neither."

Police subsequently found the plants, paraphernalia and growing equipment in all the bedrooms of the house as well as the loft.

The 44-year-old, of no fixed address, admitted producing cannabis with the intent of supplying. Huang was jailed for eight months at Wolverhampton Crown Court and it is expected he will be deported on his release.

Wolverhampton Crown Court heard how he had been recruited as the 'gardener', to grow and look after the plants before they were sold.

Recorder John Steel QC had commended the neighbours for their actions.

Mrs Bills continued: "From the outside it looked like a normal house – there were net curtains up and a vase with flowers in the window.

"You just don't imagine that something like this is going on next door to you.

"To see all the damage that had been done inside was absolutely frightening because if all those electrics had caught fire we could have been blown up."