POLK COUNTY, Fla. (WFLA) – Polk County detectives are investigating the shooting death of a Mulberry man at an illegal grow house.
Deputies responded to a call of a shooting in the 400 block of Fernandez Street on Wednesday night just before 9 p.m. When deputies arrived they found Raidel Gonzalez, 50, dead in the yard from an apparent gunshot wound.
Deputies also discovered the home was an active marijuana grow-house with over 160 pounds of marijuana inside.
“This is another example demonstrating the connection between drugs, violence, and death. Illegal marijuana cultivation is a large, dangerous, and violent business,” Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd said in a press release. “The myth that the manufacture and trafficking of illegal drugs, including marijuana, is somehow a non-violent, non-lethal, not serious crime, is a lie. Try telling Mr. Gonzalez’s family, or the innocent people who live in this neighborhood, that the manufacture, sale, and use of illegal drugs are not serious, dangerous, and deadly.”
The death investigation ongoing, as is the investigation related to the illegal grow house. Anyone with information is asked to call the Polk County Sheriff’s Office at 863-298-6200.
