​Alabama media outlets, including a TV station and a newspaper, last week reported the bust of a local marijuana grow operation by calling it a “marijuana lab.” While they probably think that sounds a lot more dangerous than “marijuana garden,” it also makes them look singularly foolish.

Dennis “Cowboy” James Davis, 47, of Oakman, Alabama is charged with trafficking marijuana and is currently being held in the Jefferson County Jail on outstanding warrants for attempted murder and shooting into an occupied dwelling, according to 42 News

Davis now faces the possibility of 99 years in prison after police found the hydroponic grow operation in a barn behind his home, reports James Phillips of the Jasper

Now, this guy Davis could well be a violent, murderous douche bag, for all I know, but to report his 400-plant marijuana grow as a “lab” is just silly.

Officers with the Walker County Narcotics Enforcement Team and the Jasper Police Department’s Narcotics Division (anybody smell fat federal grants?) responded to a “suspicious activity” call at Davis’s home in the early morning hours on December 18.

NET agent Adam Hadder said the agents went to Davis’s home on Tutwiler Road about 2 a.m., and found two men standing near a large, green barn.

“We questioned the men, one of which was Dennis James Davis, who owned the property,” Hadder said.

Officers heard generators running inside the barn, which Davis said was being used to grow tomatoes. Davis at that point foolishly gave officers permission to search his property. (Let’s go over this again, class: NEVER consent to a search. It will not make things “go easier” for you, although it will make things go considerably easier for the police.)

“We walked inside the barn, and something just didn’t look right, Hadder said. “This was a large building, but it looks really small on the inside. At the back of the room we entered, we found a fake wall. It was in that area where we found a strong marijuana odor.”

Hadder said there was a secret passageway in the wall that led to another area where they found a “large and elaborate” hydroponic marijuana grow room. (As a reminder, hydroponics is the process of growing plants in sand, gravel or liquid with nutrients added to the water. No soil is used in the hydroponic process.)

“I’ve been doing this for 13 years, and this was the most complex marijuana lab that I’ve ever seen,” the deeply clueless Hadder claimed.

Inside the room were about 400 marijuana plants that Hadder claimed were worth “at least $100,000.” He claimed the hydroponically grown plants had a street value of “as much as $400 per ounce.” (Reality check: I live in Seattle and I’ve never given $400 per ounce. I seriously doubt whether anyone in my home state of Alabama is paying that much, either.)

Police seized all of the plants and most of the growing equipment. Some of the equipment “had to be destroyed onsite because it was connected to the building,” Hadder said.

Well, I guess I need to go to my tomato “lab” now and pick a couple of fresh ones.

Look, Channel 42 and the Daily Mountain Eagle: Somebody needs to tell your news staff that marijuana is not methamphetamine and is not manufactured in “labs.”

Maybe you think it sounds sexier or more important, or like you have a Big Exclusive News Story worthy of the attention of the good people of Alabama when you call it a “lab”…

But all that really does is make your reporters look extremely foolish.