A couple of Hialeah parents are behind bars following a pot raid at their apartment.
Police say that on the first day of school, the couple's 11-year-old son told his teacher that marijuana plants were growing inside his home after she smelled marijuana on him. The teacher contacted police.
Authorities obtained a search warrant Monday and found a bedroom inside the apartment located at 5800 block of West 25th Court that was being operated as a marijuana hydroponics cultivation room.
According to an arrest report, the room contained 10 marijuana plants that weighed about 31 pounds. The search also uncovered multiple plastic bags commonly used in narcotics sales, four small bags of marijuana, two digital scales, three glass pipes used to smoke marijuana and two heat-seal vacuum machines used to package large quantities of marijuana, according to the report.
Rolando Naranjo, 41, and Betsy Espinoza, 32, allegedly shared one bedroom and slept in the same bed as their 11- and 4-year-old sons inside the two-bedroom apartment where they were squatting.
Police said their makeshift marijuana lab was located within 1,000 feet of Ben Shepard Elementary School.
Naranjo and Espinoza were arrested on charges of child neglect, manufacturing a controlled substance, possession of drug paraphernalia, possession of cannabis within 1,000 feet of a school and possession of cannabis for the purpose of trafficking.
The suspects' sons are now in the custody of the Florida Department of Children and Families.