Pubdate: Thu, 25 Mar 2004 Source: Birmingham News, The (AL) Copyright: 2004 The Birmingham News Contact: http://al.com/birminghamnews/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/45 Author: Carla Crowder, News staff writer Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/testing.htm (Drug Testing) Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/prison.htm (Incarceration) PRISON DRUG TESTS QUESTIONED Pinson businessman Tom Bagby is so convinced that one of his work-release employees was wronged by a prison drug test that he's paying the bills to fight it. Ex-prison nurse Betty Mynatt confirmed suspicions of flaws in prisoner drug screens at Birmingham Work Release by testing herself. She tested positive for methamphetamines because of medicines she takes for arthritis and ulcers. Former inmate April Rice asked prison officials for a more precise hair follicle test when a urine screen showed she had used cocaine. They refused and ordered her into drug treatment, though her original crime was not drug-related. Complaints from prisoners, parolees and others about unreliable drug tests have prompted lawyers suing the state Department of Corrections on behalf of inmates at Tutwiler prison to call for further scrutiny of Alabama's prisoner drug tests. "Based on those complaints, we have serious concerns about the accuracy and reliability of the drug testing system, and we urge the department to conduct a thorough investigation of these problems," said Tamara Serwer Caldas, an attorney with the Atlanta-based Southern Center for Human Rights. The nonprofit law firm represents female prisoners in a federal lawsuit that, so far, has prompted a judge to declare conditions at Tutwiler prison unconstitutionally crowded and unsafe. "At times, ADOC does receive complaints alleging false positives in our drug-testing procedures. If allegations regarding errors are made, ADOC will investigate all incidents brought to our attention," said spokesman Brian Corbett. Birmingham Work Release, which houses about 250 female inmates who work at businesses, is at the heart of the controversy. However, if the allegations prove true, this could have wider repercussions for prisons. That's because Correctional Officer Willie Lee, who tests the Birmingham women, is responsible for drug testing at Donaldson prison, Hamilton Aged and Infirm prison, Hamilton Work Release and sometimes Bibb County prison. He's been doing it since 1989. Jobs are at stake: Lee also screens DOC employees for illegal drugs. A positive test on an employee is sent to a private laboratory for confirmation. Inmates are not given that opportunity. "We don't send inmate samples out," Lee testified in a deposition. Prisoners lose their jobs, are denied parole and lose privileges such as phone calls and visits with their families based on positive drug tests. Prisoners must also pay $25 and the cost of materials in a relapse program. "It's certainly not a level playing field," Corrections Commissioner Donal Campbell said. Jobs are at stake for both prison employees and inmates on work release, he said. "If someone says that that's a problem, I can assure you I will look at it," Campbell said. Birmingham Work Release immediately sends women back to Tutwiler prison after a dirty screen. Attorneys for the inmates say dozens of women have been wrongly returned to prison. Crowding at Tutwiler has led to a federal order to reduce the population, leading DOC to pay more than $1 million to a Louisiana private prison to house Alabama prisoners. Among the concerns raised by attorneys for the prisoners: inadequate controls against contamination of samples, no medical reviews, no mechanism to ensure a positive test is not the result of legal medicines. Inmate Jimmie Beavers tested clean for seven years of weekly drug screens at Birmingham Work Release. Most of that time, she worked for Thomas Bagby at Bagby Gage Sticks, a Pinson company that makes rods to measure service station storage tanks. 'They get so jaded': Bagby promoted Beavers because she was so reliable. She wouldn't even take cold medicine because she didn't want trouble on the drug tests, Bagby said. "I never had any reason to suspect drug use." On Dec. 8, Beavers' weekly drug screen tested positive for benzodiazepine, a prescription drug. DOC sent her back to Tutwiler. She requested a hair follicle test. Her family would pay for it, she said in a five-page letter to Commissioner Campbell pleading her case. "I am not guilty of this and want the opportunity to prove my innocence," Beavers wrote. Bagby hired Birmingham lawyer Dagney Walker to help Beavers, who has an April 5 parole hearing in her manslaughter case. Walker said she's contacted 10 employees of the prison and parole systems trying to clear up the matter so Beavers' parole won't be denied based on an erroneous test. "It's unbelievable," she said. "They get so jaded; they're not willing to consider the option that this person is telling the truth." That's what Mynatt, a nurse who worked at Birmingham Work Release for a year, found. "When I got there, they'd been sending girls back (to Tutwiler) for dirty urine for amphetamines and not checking what medications they'd been on," Mynatt said. Zantac, the only medicine available at the facility for ulcers and other stomach ailments, and certain cold and sinus medicines show positive for illegal amphetamines, she found. Sometimes a second test would clear the prisoners, but by then they had lost their jobs. "These girls work hard; when they get a job, they want to keep it," Mynatt said. She said she raised the problem to prison officials, was told to stay out of it and eventually was asked to resign. Ex-inmate April Rice, 26, is back home in Huntsville after losing her work release job because of a test for cocaine in June 2003. Rice, who was serving two years for theft by deception, tried to get a retest, but was forced into a drug rehabilitation program instead. "I never ever used cocaine in my life," Rice said. "The officers told me there had been false positives," she said. "They refused to retest me, that it wasn't DOC policy." - --- MAP posted-by: Terry Liittschwager