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Home marijuana farm goes up in smoke

By BEN MONTGOMERY
Published April 13, 2007

BRANDON - The man sat in the squad car, back seat, wearing jeans and a three-button shirt the color of the sky.

He looked calm, even if a 4 a.m. fire burned the roof off his house and exposed his secret to the world.

Authorities say Juan Carlos Fernandez, 44, who walked his bulldog daily and waved at kids on Julie Lane, was running a marijuana farm undetected inside a 2,200-square-foot home in neighborhood where peonies grow from window boxes and American flags hang from front porches.

His neighbors gathered on the sidewalks Thursday morning and watched sheriff's deputies pass plastic flats of 10-inch marijuana plants through a broken window.

Some wondered why they hadn't seen evidence of the illegal gardening inside.

"I've never noticed anything unusual about this house," said Joyce Till, 71, who moved here in 1968 and raised five kids down the street. "It's always quiet."

"I tried to talk to him once but he didn't speak English," said Oscar Thompson, who has lived across the street for 40 years. "But I never had no problems with him. I didn't mess with him and he didn't mess with me."

Was he surprised?

"I'm 77 years old," he said. "What am I going to be surprised about?"

Investigators determined that the fire started in the kitchen after a pot was left on the stove. It took 21 firefighters and seven units 45 minutes to get the fire under control.

The house was a total loss.

Fernandez was arrested on a felony charge of the manufacture of cannabis. He was out on $2,000 bond by afternoon.

Ben Montgomery can be reached at bmontgomery@sptimes.com or 813 661-2443.

[Last modified April 13, 2007, 00:50:39]