FEDS CRACK DOWN ON DRUG USE IN JAILS

More drug-sniffing dogs and high-tech body scanners will be deployed
in prisons in a new $120-million federal program to fight inmate drug
use, federal Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day announced Friday in B.C.

"Illicit drugs in federal prisons compromise the safety and security
of correctional staff as well as our communities," Day said during a
visit to maximum-security Kent Institution in Agassiz.

Prison drug use undermines rehabilitation programs and increases the
rate at which freed cons reoffend, Day said.

The five-year program will boost numbers of drug dogs
"significantly," add more ion and X-ray scanners, increase
intelligence-gathering within prisons and surrounding communities,
enhance prisons' perimeter security and impose a scheduled-visits policy.

Day said 800 drug seizures were made in Canadian prisons last year.
Visitors bring drugs in, and drugs have been packed in tennis balls
and launched over prison fences, Day said.