PREET BHARARA, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York; JOHN P. GILBRIDE, the Special Agent in Charge of the New York Field Division of the Drug Enforcement Administration (“DEA”); and JAMES T. HAYES, JR., the Special Agent in Charge of Immigration and Customs Enforcement - Homeland Security Investigations (“ICE -HSI”), announced the arrest yesterday of LAWRENCE C. HERZ and MICHAEL J. SZTROPKALYI for operating a marijuana grow house. U.S. Attorney PREET BHARARA stated, “These alleged drug producers and distributors might have seemed ingenious, operating a ‘grow house’ with some 150 marijuana plants in an obscure, rural area. Fortunately, federal law enforcement officers and their local counterparts were smarter. I commend the cooperative efforts that shut down this operation and brought its alleged perpetrators to justice.”