HILO — Hilo police investigating a burglary Wednesday in Waiakea Uka made an unrelated and unexpected discovery — a minivan carrying a large number of marijuana plants parked in a neighboring driveway.

According to Capt. Randall Medeiros of the Criminal Investigative Section, a woman was also inside the van on Malaai Road. Police arrested 35-year-old Mary Lolita Santos, who gave arresting officers the name Mary L. Hamilton.

"By chance, patrol officers ... came across her in a vehicle. In the back of the vehicle was a total of 111 marijuana plants, seedlings to a foot in height," Medeiros said. "They just walked past her. It was in her driveway."

Medeiros said Santos consented when officers asked to search her van, so no search warrant was necessary.

"(The marijuana) was in plain view," he said.

Santos was arrested and charged with first-degree commercial promotion of marijuana, which is punishable by up to 20 years in prison, and possession of drug paraphernalia.

She was released after posting $12,000 bond and is scheduled for arraignment and plea April 14 at 1:30 p.m. in Hilo District Court.

Santos has 15 criminal convictions, all on the Big Island between 1992 and last October, mostly for misdemeanors and petty misdemeanors.

She has two felony convictions, both in 1995 in Kona Circuit Court for second-degree theft. She received one-year jail sentences for both convictions with six months suspended on the first count and 309 days suspended in the second. She also received five years probation for each offense.