TORIES TAKE AIM AT PRISON DRUG DEALING

Organized crime may be about to lose its grip on one of its most
profitable markets as the Harper government moves to put an end to
drug smuggling into penitentiaries.

In this war on drugs, Ottawa will spend $120 million over the next
four years to hire 80 teams of drug-sniffing dogs and 165 security
intelligence officers. It also has replaced or installed 30 X-ray
machines and scanners at federal prisons. Ottawa also plans to put
extra staff on towers to stop drugs from being thrown over walls into
Canada's prisons, said Public Safety Canada spokesperson Jacinthe Perras.

The illicit drug trade in Canada's prisons is rarely heard about on
the outside, but an internal security report provides a window into
its workings.

Some inmates use their court appearances as occasions to act as drug
mules. On the day of their sentencing, some convicted criminals place
the drugs inside their bodies, pre-measured and placed in specific
coloured balloons or condoms. Inside the prison, the dealers retrieve,
check and weigh the drug packages. If a mule is believed to have
tampered with a drug package, the punishment can be deadly, the report
notes.

The drugs are then repackaged for sale. The mules hardly ever
distribute the drugs, and often the drugs they smuggle are owned by
another inmate. Other inmates are hired to distribute the drugs.

In the prison drug trade, credit is rare; drugs are almost always paid
for at the point of sale. The sellers are accountable for any
shortages of product or of money, according to one longtime prison
intelligence officer. Punishment for skimming is swift and vicious.

Drugs can be paid for in cigarettes, cash or funds deposited in bank
accounts held by the dealer's associates on the street.