Pubdate: Mon, 01 Oct 2012
Source: Edmonton Sun (CN AB)
Copyright: 2012 Canoe Limited Partnership.
Contact:  http://www.edmontonsun.com
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/135

GET TOUGH ON NEEDLING FELONS

When a criminal is sent off to a federal penitentiary -- locked up 
behind bars, monitored by cameras and roving guards, and with all 
visitors purportedly patted down for contraband -- coming out the 
other end as a drug addict is a far cry from rehabilitation.

But it happens far too often.

Our prisons, in fact, are rife with drug addicts, those who arrived 
with an dependence on opiates, and those who join the fraternity from 
the inside.

Blame poor body searches, blame rogue guards, blame complicit 
lawyers. Blame whatever.

But there is no shortage of supply.

While inmates have demanded clean needles many times before, only to 
be turned away because of the risk of them becoming weapons against 
corrections officers, a former Warkworth inmate, as well as four AIDS 
prevention advocacy groups, are now taking Ottawa to court for 
repeatedly giving them the bum's rush.

The case should be rejected.

It is bad enough that inmates who arrive at prison gates with 
pre-existing opiate addictions -- to heroin, cocaine, and narcotic 
pain pills -- are given daily doses of methadone to take off the 
edge, but to acquiesce to their demand for clean needles would be 
both idiotic and counter-productive.

Toughness is what is needed. When the rate of HIV and hepatitis C 
infections are upwards of 30 times higher in prisons, the problem is 
not solved by handing out clean hypes as if prisons were Vancouver's 
Eastside and every cell was a safe-injection site.

The problem is solved by thorough searches of everyone, including 
guards and lawyers, the regular tossing of cells for illegal drugs 
and drug paraphernalia, and random drug tests of all inmates.

Don't get us started on "privacy rights." The privacy rights of 
criminals should end the moment the judge pronounces their sentence.

While it is not pretty to witness, even the most benevolent 
substance-abuse counsellor will concede that cold turkey works.

While it is not pretty to witness, even the most benevolent 
substance-abuse counsellor will concede that cold turkey works.

It will not be fun. It will not be painless. And it will definitely 
enrage hug-a-thug liberals.

But what better place for a supervised intervention into the 
crippling effects of these criminals' narcotic dependence than behind 
the walls of a prison?

After all, it is not as if they can walk out.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom