INMATE DRUG TESTS QUESTIONED

Complaints from prisoners, parolees and others about unreliable drug tests
have prompted lawyers suing Alabama's Department of Corrections on behalf
of inmates at Julia Tutwiler Prison to call for a closer look at the
system's drug testing program.

Prisoners lose their jobs, are denied parole and lose privileges such as
phone calls and visits with their families based on positive drug tests.
Prisoners also must pay $25 and the cost of materials in a relapse program.

Former inmate April Rice asked prison officials for a more precise hair
follicle test when a urine screen showed she had used cocaine. They ordered
her into drug treatment instead, although her original crime was not
drug-related.

Betty Mynatt, a former prison nurse, confirmed suspicions of flaws in drug
screens at Birmingham Work Release by testing herself. She tested positive
for methamphetamines because of medicines she takes for arthritis and ulcers.

"Based on those complaints, we have serious concerns about the accuracy and
reliability of the drug testing system, and we urge the department to
conduct a thorough investigation of these problems," Tamara Serwer Caldas,
an attorney with the Atlanta-based Southern Center for Human Rights said.

The nonprofit law firm represents female prisoners in a federal lawsuit
that has prompted a judge to declare conditions at Tutwiler
unconstitutionally crowded and unsafe.

Concerns raised by attorneys for the prisoners include inadequate controls
against contamination of samples, no medical reviews and no mechanism to
ensure a positive test is not the result of legal medicines.

"It's certainly not a level playing field," Corrections Commissioner Donal
Campbell said.

Jobs are at stake for both prison employees and inmates on work release, he
said. "If someone says that that's a problem, I can assure you I will look
at it," Campbell said.