Eduart Dida, 39, was arrested in a neighbour’s garden after jumping over a fence after police kicked the door in at the Lichfield Road property in Great Yarmouth yesterday morning.
Dida was taken to Great Yarmouth Police Investigation Centre for questioning and later charged with being concerned in the production of a quantity of the class B drug.
He was remanded in custody, and today he appeared in Norwich Magistrates’ Court.
Dida entered no plea to the allegation and was remanded in custody until his next hearing at Norwich Crown Court on October 17.
The court heard that Dida is an Albanian national who was “here illegally” and that there were “80 mature plants” found across “five rooms” in the property on Lichfield Road.
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The prosecutor said “the Crown believe” he had a “significant role” in the operation.
He was refused bail.
Neighbours were “shocked” to wake up yesterday morning to “around a dozen” police on their street and to learn the property was being used to grow cannabis.
One said: “There is a sense of community here, we all know each other either by name or at least just to say hello to.
“I have spoken to a few neighbours who are very shocked that the house was being used as a cannabis grow. It’s really quiet here, so nobody expected this.”
Other neighbours said they saw police emptying the property and saw officers carrying the cannabis plants and growing equipment out.
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Another man said they walked past while police were clearing it out and saw “loads of electrical wires” hanging from the ceiling.
A woman, who wished not to be named, said she “thought it was weird” that she could hear “construction work” going on in there until “the early hours of the morning” in the last couple of weeks.
The property police raided has a CCTV camera on the front of it and two cameras around the back.
UK Power Network were in attendance at the address yesterday following the police raid.
It is estimated that one plant can produce around £1,000 worth of cannabis.
