Prison dogs sniff out synthetics
The race to stub out the spread of synthetic substances is on and New Zealand prisons are no exception.
The Department of Corrections has trained five dog teams this year to identify the psychoactive substances.
Trends outside prison are replicated inside on a smaller scale, Central Region dog section supervisor Steve Shadbolt said.
‘‘We are trying to speed the process up as it’s coming, it’s here, but it’s going to get worse. So we are preparing ourselves for the upcoming battle.
‘‘So we have prepared ourselves and we can also assist police should they require searches outside of prison.’’
Nineteen people have been admitted to hospital in the past two weeks and on Monday, a Christchurch man died from what is believed to be the result of synthetic cannabis use.
Shadbolt’s six-year-old dog Ciggie has added new psychoactive substances to his repertoire, having already been trained to sniff out cell phones and tobacco.
Based at Waikeria, Shadbolt and Ciggie also cover Spring Hill and Tongariro correction facilities. Shadbolt doesn’t think that synthetic cannabis should be compared to cannabis.
‘‘If someone is on cannabis, you are more likely to have them fall asleep on you.
‘‘You generally wouldn’t get the violence from them on cannabis – it’s a relaxant.
‘‘But on synthetic cannabis – the ones I have seen on it heavily – it’s very similar to being on methamphetamine. They’re not in control. You get the violence, obviously, excess use of it leads to death – but the reactions I’ve seen are similar to methamphetamine.’’
Contraband is in all the country’s prisons. That includes cell phones, drugs, shanks and nicotine patches, which are a hot commodity.
They sell for around $10 a patch and the inmates break them down to smoke.
‘‘Everything is tradeable,’’ Shadbolt said, ‘‘phone cards for nicotine patches, smoking lozenges – prisoners powder them up and some of them snort it, others wrap it in their Bible pages to smoke it. They think they’ll get something out of it – probably a headache, that is about all.’’
Waikeria prison is around 1200 hectares and to stop contraband getting in is an enormous task, which is why detector dogs are useful.
They can cover large areas in a matter of minutes, areas which would take a person hours if not days to search.
‘‘They do miss things. They are fallible – they are dogs. But it’s an ongoing battle and the more dog teams we have to cover sites, it makes it better for us.
‘‘But you just aren’t going to win it. You do your best to disrupt it as best you can.’’
Minister of Corrections Kelvin Davis said in September that it’s known synthetic drugs pose a significant risk to people’s safety, security and well-being, both inside and outside prison.
‘‘It’s not a widespread problem in prisons, but we need to stay one step ahead in preventing these substances from being introduced and distributed in the first place. This is about being proactive to ensure staff, prisoners and visitors are kept safe.
‘‘The ingredients of synthetic drugs are constantly changing, which means training will have to be ongoing, but this is an important step towards mitigating the potential dangers of these harmful substances.
‘‘The next step is to make it easier for Corrections to test prisoners suspected of taking synthetic drugs, to ensure people receive appropriate rehabilitation and drug treatment where needed’’.