POLICING STONED DRIVERS STILL UPHILL BATTLE FOR POLICE

For the all the attention given to drunk drivers, there are still few
tools available for police to detect drugged drivers and get them off
the road.

Unlike alcohol, drug ingestion cannot be easily and quantifiably
measured at the roadside.

Currently, the only drug detection device is trained officers like
Const. Bruce Poirier.

Until his certification lapsed last year, he was Kelowna's only drug
recognition expert.

"In my job, I was like a human breathalyzer machine," Poirier
says.

Poirier was one of too few police officers in B.C. trained to
recognize the effects of different classes of drugs on the human body.

That training was recognized by the Canadian Senate as an effective
tool against drugged drivers when it recommended to Parliament that it
legalize marijuana and relax drug laws.

The training uses the best information from medical doctors,
psychologists and optometrists. By doing a few simple tests, Poirier
could tell if any driver was under the influence of drugs and if so,
what kind.

He says the program was developed in Los Angeles where officers felt
uneasy letting some people back on the road for lack of evidence.

"They were stopping vehicles and they new something was wrong with the
driver but they're getting zero readings on the breathalyzers,"
Poirier says.

"They knew they were probably dealing with drugs but there was little
they could do."

Each of seven different classifications of drugs produces a different
response in eye control and other tell-tale indicators.

But there are still very few trained officers in B.C. because drivers
have the right to refuse to perform standard field sobriety tests.

In the U.S., some states have a rule of implied consent attached to
drivers licences and under that rule a driver must perform a roadside
test on the demand of a peace officer.

The combination of officer training and modifications to some of our
laws is seen as the only effective response.

The Canada Safety Council is pushing for some of these new laws to
cover drugged drivers in a new legal climate surrounding marijuana
laws.

If a police officer in B.C. suspects a driver is seriously impaired,
they can obtain saliva and other fluid samples to make a case for
impaired driving. Increasingly, however, police are relying on 24-hour
roadside suspensions.

Trained drug recognition experts are used more widely than in traffic
and impaired driving cases.

When Poirier was certified he could be called nearly anywhere in the
Interior for his expertise.

Poirier says recent court cases in the Lower Mainland are proving just
how effective their training is and sees it as an emerging tool in law
enforcement.