DRUGS, ALCOHOL GROWING PROBLEM IN JAILS

It's just before 9 a.m. on Oct. 9 and a uniform-wearing deputy sheriff
allegedly meets a 22-year-old woman in a parking lot a few blocks from
the Dartmouth provincial court building.

They don't know that police are watching.

The pair drive off in separate cars, and officers, who had started an
investigation a few days earlier, quickly arrest the woman on Chadwick
Street and nab the sheriff in the courthouse parking lot.

Tyrone David is charged with 12 counts of possession for the purpose
of trafficking cocaine, marijuana, hashish, ecstasy, morphine,
Dilaudid, hydromorphone, Valium and amphetamines. Kathleen Mary
Kierans, 22, receives three charges of trafficking in marijuana,
hashish and Valium.

Ms. Kierans is the girlfriend of known crime figure Jimmy Melvin, who
was in the Central Nova Scotia Correctional Facility in Dartmouth at
the time.

Police say the drugs were destined for the jail.

On July 14, a guard at Central Nova allegedly sees Halifax lawyer Anne
Calder, 56, take something out of her documents and pass it under a
table to an inmate/client in a meeting room there.

Guards later search that inmate and allegedly seize tobacco and some
white powder.

Ms. Calder is charged with trafficking the prescription painkiller
hydromorphone and possession of both hydromorphone and marijuana for
the purpose of trafficking. She voluntarily suspends her practice that
same month.

The charges against Mr. David, Ms. Kierans and Ms. Calder have not
been proven in court. Mr. David is on paid administrative leave from
his job, pending the outcome of his case. The next court appearance
for Mr. David and Ms. Kierans, who is out on bail, is Nov. 25. Ms.
Calder's trial is set for April.

On June 16, Steven James Meekins, 27, of Dartmouth misses a sentencing
hearing for robbery and other charges at Halifax provincial court
because he got too drunk on homemade booze while incarcerated at
Central Nova. He is taken to hospital and his sentencing is
rescheduled for a few weeks later.

These three cases vividly illustrate the problems caused by drugs at
the Dartmouth jail.

"We have at least three incidents a week at Central," David Horner,
the executive director of correctional services for the Nova Scotia
Justice Department, said in a recent interview.

The incidents are seizures, both from inmates and others, and include
tobacco, lighters, homemade liquor, marijuana, cocaine, ecstasy,
methadone, prescription drugs and other contraband at the jail.
Provincial jails in Cape Breton, Yarmouth, Amherst, Antigonish and the
youth facility in Waterville have had a total of 22 contraband
seizures this year.

Booze is always a problem and the swill that inmates manage to brew up
actually sounds easier to make than it would be to drink.

An inmate just has to sneak away after a meal or kitchen duty with a
bit of sugar and bread, pieces of fruit or vegetables and then mix
that with some water, seal it in a bag or container, hide it and wait
for it to ferment. "When it is sealed off it is very difficult to
detect," Mr. Horner said.

So far this year, jail guards at the Dartmouth jail have seized more
than 180 litres of booze, called "brew" by inmates and staff. They've
also seized marijuana, hashish, cocaine, crack cocaine, ecstasy,
store-bought alcohol, methadone and prescription pills.

Central Nova has had five cases this year where inmates had to be
taken to hospital after overdoing it on drugs or alcohol.

Mr. Horner blames the amount of drugs at the jail on the size (it
holds 336 inmates) and complexity of the institution. Central Nova has
a lot of people who come and go, either as visitors or inmates, and it
is both a provincial jail and a remand centre for people awaiting
trial, sometimes on extremely serious charges.

"Drugs in facilities are not a good thing," he said. "It increases the
risk in a facility for staff and offenders both."

Although he didn't provide complete details of their anti-drug
measures, believing it could help people who want to beat the system,
he said they do take a lot of steps to stem the flow.

In terms of anti-drug tools, the jails have extra staff, parcel
scanners, metal-detecting wands, numerous video cameras and BOSS
seats. Some inmates have to sit in the BOSS chair (Body Orifice
Security Scanner), which searches for metal in body cavities.

Two new ion scanners at Central Nova can trace extremely small amounts
of explosives and drugs on the clothes or skin of inmates.

All inmates are strip-searched on arrival, but they can still swallow
drugs in condoms - a dangerous practice - and pass them for later use.
Others, often inmates serving weekends, may want to "suitcase" drugs
into a jail by inserting them into their anal cavity and retrieving
them later.

Drugs can also be taped under a prisoner's or visitor's scrotum or
breasts, hidden in clothes or parcels or brought in by staff,
contractors or other visitors.

Mr. Horner said jail staff simply can't perform a body cavity search
on everyone.

"You'd have to have some pretty good grounds in order to do that," he
said.

Inmates who are caught with contraband are usually segregated and
otherwise penalized.

Mr. Horner said drugs are a problem in all Canadian jails and he said
his staff are "very committed to a safe environment and a safe workplace."

Saint Mary's University criminology professor David Perrier, a former
RCMP member who teaches courses in penology, agrees with Mr. Horner
about the prevalence of drugs in jails.

"You can get almost anything in an institution," he
said.

He said long-term inmates can put pressure on other inmates and
visitors to help get drugs.

Because inmates have a lot of time to cook up schemes, they can be
quite creative, he said.

He's heard of drugs being hidden in small orange balls, similar to
those found at Central Nova's outdoor exercise yard, which were thrown
over fences onto the property for inmates to pick up.

There can be a pervasive drug culture inside institutions because of
the population's habits and their free time. So, if an addict is in
jail and feels pressure from other inmates to bring drugs in, he'll
try hard to find a way, he said.

"You're certainly not free to walk away from these influences," he
said.

He believes that prescription drugs, which can be highly addictive,
are becoming the drug of choice in jails because they are more potent,
and because of their small size, easier to smuggle.