DROP REPORTED IN PRISON DRUG USE

Officials say testing, fear of punishment works

BOSTON -- Corrections officials say fear, not treatment, is the best way to
keep prisoners off drugs.

But advocates for prison inmates say drug users in the state's jails need
more treatment.

The state Department of Corrections announced this week that the number of
inmates using drugs has dropped sharply in the last three years.

"If you test them frequently enough, you will force them to break the
habit," Timothy App, assistant deputy commissioner for community
corrections, told a Boston newspaper.

Inmates in the two minimum-security programs at the Bristol County House of
Correction are tested for drug use at least once a week, jail spokesman
Bernard Sullivan told The Standard-Times.

"Between the pre-release, where inmates are being prepared to go out
into the community, and the drug rehab program at the David R. Nelson
Correctional Alcohol Center, for obvious reasons, those people are tested
regularly," Mr. Sullivan said.

In the general population at both Ash Street and Dartmouth facilities, drug
testing is random.

"Any suggestion or hint of a problem with an inmate, there is a test done,"
Mr. Sullivan said. "Our people know when someone is not acting normally."

Mr. Sullivan said one longtime jail employee said he had noticed a decrease
in drug-related incidents in the jail buildings, most likely a result of
more restricted access by inmates.

Officials give some credit to treatment programs for the decline in use,
but say prisoners stop mostly because they fear punishment if they test
positive for drugs. App said inmates are tested at random and when they are
suspected of using drugs.

Jill Brotman, executive director of the prisoner advocacy group
Massachusetts Prison Society, said the department spends too much on
testing and not enough on programs.

"Counseling, mental health and educational programs provide people with the
wherewithal to lead drug-free lives, not drug testing and punitive
policies," Brotman said.

Last year, urine tests given to 0.3 percent of prisoners were positive,
compared with 2.3 percent in 1995.

App said inmates with positive tests are dealt with on a case-by-case
basis. Punishment may be loss of library access, canteen use, visits or
being transferred to an area with higher security.

In extreme cases, prisoners may be referred for treatment and prosecution.

Officials said 22,303 prisoners were tested in 1995, and 507 showed drugs.
Last year, 62,417 inmates, close to three times as many, were tested, and
192, or 62 percent fewer than in 1995, showed drugs.

The number of inmates caught using drugs tends to drop as the number of
tests increase, say officials.

Attorney General Janet Reno called the Massachusetts policy exemplary, and
federal officials invited App to talk about the policies last fall to help
other states come up with their own.

App said corrections officials spent $150,000 on testing last year and
expect to spend $200,000 this year.

Anthony Carnevale, spokesman for the department, said it spends slightly
less than $3 million a year on drug treatment.

States are required to have prison drug policies that conform to federal
guidelines to remain eligible for federal money for capital improvements in
prisons.

The Department of Correction got $8,693,941 in federal money last year and
a total of $9,942,394 since the grant program was implemented in 1996, said
Steven Amos, deputy director of the Justice Department's correction program
office.