PRISON GETS HIGH-TECH DRUG-TESTING EQUIPMENT

HUTCHINSON -- The warden will know if you have taken drugs before you try
to walk into the prison here.

He has tried out the new high-tech drug testing equipment himself. He came
up clean, but a woman who tried to visit an inmate at the Hutchinson
Correctional Center after taking cocaine couldn't get past the device.

The prison recently bought two ion spectrometers for $29,875 each along
with a $115,000, four-ton AS&E BodySearch machine -- paid for with a
$500,000 grant from the federal government and the National Institute of
Corrections, said Warden Robert Hannigan, who was declared drug-free after
he was the first to be tested by the BodySearch machine. The spectrometers
can check for 32 different substances, including cocaine, heroin and
marijuana. If a visitor tests positive on the spectrometer, that is grounds
for a test by the BodySearch machine, which uses low-level X-rays to take
photographs through a person's clothes.

The visitor has a choice of that or a body search. The woman who tested
positive for cocaine opted to leave and come back another day.

Hannigan said the equipment, along with sophisticated urinalysis testing
and two new drug detection dogs, will improve the prison's ability to reach
its goal of zero tolerance for drugs.