Babbling naked man draws police to pot farm

updated 6:31 p.m. ET Aug. 2, 2006

HIGHLAND MILLS, N.Y. - Robert Ferranti probably has more than the usual regrets of someone found rolling around naked on a neighborhood street, babbling, immune to pepper spray and accused of punching a police officer.

Investigators following up on the Monday fracas said they discovered a well-equipped marijuana growing operation in the house Ferranti rented with another man in a normally quiet community in southern Orange County.

"They were growing so much and storing so much, the odor was overwhelming," Woodbury Police Sgt. Clifford Weeks said. "For this town, it was a good-sized operation."

In addition to public lewdness, resisting arrest and assault charges, the 35-year-old Ferranti faces a felony count of second-degree criminal possession of marijuana. The other residents of the house — Michael P. Cody, and Cody's children Deirdre, 26, and Michael, 25 — were each hit with the same felony drug possession charge, police said.

A 911 call about Ferranti's antics touched off the events that led police to the house, which was set up to grow, dry and package marijuana, police said. Five pounds of the weed packaged for sale, $10,000 in cash, a 3-foot-tall hookah and a cache of martial arts weapons were found at the house, Weeks said.

After treatment for minor injuries and a mental health evaluation, Ferranti was ordered held on $10,000 bail at the Orange County Jail. The Codys were released from jail on $5,000 bail each.

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