AN Albanian migrant who crossed the English Channel in a small boat has been jailed after police found him minding a £500,000 cannabis farm in Devon.

Idajet Beqiri was arrested at Dover after entering Britain illegally on October 10 last year and was held in immigration detention centres for a few weeks before the Home Office moved him to a hotel in Brighton.

He absconded and worked illegally as a cleaner in Birmingham and Manchester before moving to Torquay in June this year to work at a 419 plant cannabis factory at a disused nightclub.

He tried to flee across a roof but was arrested and police found evidence he had been living in a makeshift flat at the club with a camp bed, cooker, fridge and washing machine.

The grow at the Bohemia Club in Torwood Street was highly sophisticated with specially created growing rooms, specialist lights, insulation and ventilation and an electricity supply that by-passed the meter.

Beqiri, aged 24, of Torwood Street, Torquay, admitted cultivation of cannabis and was jailed for five months by Recorder Mr David Chidgey at Exeter Crown Court. He will be processed for deportation on his release.

Mr Lewis Aldous, prosecuting, said the building was raided on June 26 after police discovered it was being used to grow cannabis by an Albanian crime group.

There were two main growing rooms with a total of 419 plants in three different stages of growth with an estimated potential yield of 50 kilograms. The electricity supply had been tampered with and there was evidence of someone living on site.

A police drugs expert estimated the value of the drugs at between £200,000 to £500,000, depending on whether they were sold in bulk or in street deals.

Mr Paul Dentith, mitigating, said Beqiri came to Torquay in the belief he would be working as a cleaner but then became a trainee, being taught how to water and feed the plants by a more senior grower who escaped during the police raid.

He said: 'Beqiri came to England on October 10, 2022 in a small boat and was detained in Dover and spent ten days in an immigration detention centre before being moved to Heathrow for a number of weeks.

'He was released from there to a hotel in Brighton which he left and went to Birmingham and Manchester where he worked as a cleaner to support himself.

'He explains that he was asked to work in Torquay and within two weeks was being trained how to water and feed the plants.

'I can confirm that his immigration status is illegal and that he will be deported. He simply wants to go back to Albania.'