High School Student suspended for NOT having drugs!!!

[ReformMaryJaneLaws]

The Co-President of the URI chapter of the SSDP sent this article out asking that people send an email to the editor of Narragansett Times at mobrien@ricentral.com telling her what we think about this. He claims that she is "sympathetic" to this issue and hopes that if enough people write in that she will editorialize on the issue. So, send an email expressing your outrage.








Pubdate: Wed, 04 Feb 2004
Source: Narragansett Times (RI)
Author: Jessica Hurst
Contact: mobrien@ricentral.com

Dogs sniff drugs at NHS

NARRAGANSETT - Who let the dogs out?

Last Friday morning marked the first random search by police canines for drugs at Narragansett High School, leading to four locker searches and one student suspension.

No actual contraband was found and no arrests were made, said Narragansett Police Chief J. David Smith in a telephone interview Monday morning.

"The dogs did indicate that four separate locations in the school were positive for scent," he added.

Two scent-positive locations in the junior hallway and two in the senior hallway were searched by administration, and while no drugs were found, in one locker, "the smell [of marijuana] was overwhelming," said Smith.

School administrators suspended the locker's owner for three days.

The scent in the student's locker was an indication of "residual use," of marijuana, said Superintendent Pia Durkin in a telephone interview Monday.
And part of the drug search project is to confront "the addiction issue before it becomes a legal issue," she said.

After school Monday, junior Sean Hames, 17, said he was surprised that a student could be suspended from school for something that could have happened outside of school.

And, he said, "He could have just been in a car full of students smoking weed," and not necessarily using drugs himself.

He called the drug searches "an invasion of privacy," and felt they were being used as a scare tactic.

Smith calls the searches a deterrent. "We feel it sends a very strong message."

At meetings last December among school and police officials, a persistent "sub-culture" of drug use was identified, and on December 17 Smith presented the canine searches to the school committee.

An informational letter was sent home to parents, and students were informed of the procedure basics in advance of last Friday's search.

The information helped to reduce anxiety, said Durkin.

The advance information may have also been a heads-up to potential offenders, said Narragansett High School junior Holly Bezak, 17, outside the high school Monday.

"I don't think they should have told students about it ahead of time, because everybody knew not to leave anything in their locker," she said.

Neither she nor junior Kerrie Lemoi, 16, think the drug presence on campus is serious enough to warrant the searches.

"It's definitely not necessary," said Lemoi. But they also aren't concerned about the searches.

"Nobody really cares," said Lemoi of the student sentiment. "Every school has it."
Bezak said while the searches didn't bother her, "Maybe it's because I don't have anything to worry about."

John Dossantos, 16, a sophomore, said the searches are "Wack. They don't search Providence, but they search little Narragansett."

During Friday's search, three dogs and their handlers - K-9s from the Westerly Police Department and the Rhode Island State Police, and
Narragansett's own K-9, "Rocki" - canvassed sections of the school starting at about 7:35 a.m. and through first period.

The Westerly and state police K-9s performed the in-door searches and Rocki searched the parking lot.

Only Smith and Durkin knew about the search beforehand - school administration was notified at about 6:45 a.m. that morning, said Smith.

Both he and Durkin were present for the first search, but will not necessarily be present in the future.

"We just kind of wanted to see how it was going to go," said Smith.

Students were on "lockdown" during the searches, for first period classes - a drill procedure that became state mandate in the aftermath of the September 11 terrorist attacks, and will continue to coincide with the drug searches at the high school.

Students who came late were kept in the office, including sophomore Alex Smith, 15, who missed his first period class.

"As long as they're not going through my stuff, I don't care," he said after school Monday.

Most of the students did not see the search dogs, although Lemoi's first period class was in a classroom at the front of the building, and she saw them out the window.

Friday's search did run a little over time because of the "learning curve," said Smith, lasting about half an hour, but he expects the random drills to last about 20 minutes in the future.

Dogs will search areas like lockers, parking areas, and the faculty lounge, and procedure indicates that only when two dogs positively identify an area will school officials search the area.

[thccrystals]

I would have cursed off about 100 people if that happened to me. I'm just waiting for the day...

[Sad Panda]

What the fuck.

What a country we live in.

Holy shit.

[hippie john]

i like how he says, " i could have just been in a car full of people smoking weed, not accually using it myself".... uhhm, yes, but you'd still be gettin high from all that smoke in the car, its called hotboxing moron.... heh,damn stoners need to thinik their answers through

[Cornflake]

Maybe he was high when he said it, that can impede my correct use of words/grammar sometimes. I'd be so pissed if they'd tried to search my highschool, but then again I don't know if anyone actually left it in lockers I and my friends always used to keep ours in our bags and carry it to classes and stuff (which I'm sure would have worked out well if there were search dogs). Then again I can't think of why a schoolboard would allow it, I know no schools around here would have done it, I'm in Canada though.

[galvingirl]

what i think is really wrong is suspending the kid, obvioulsy thepolice didnt have enough evidence to do anything, so neither did the school, ther could have been reasons of why the dogs picked up a strong sent at his locker, and he could have been doing it outside of school, so how do they get the right to suspend him? also if they suspended one kid but found others with the same sent just not as strong and they didnt get suspended i would be pissed if i were that kid.but having a random search is kind of understandable since is ilegal and obviouly there are going ot be kids who do drugs so the school wanted to find out, and students shouldnt be dumb enough to bring drugs to school anyways, obvioulsy that day there werent any in the lockers..or at least that they found

[shitloaf]

Back in my High school, they only did a search dog visit when I was a freshman. At that time I didn't smoke, but it wouldn't have mattered in any case, because everyone knew that to keep weed in a locker was an exquisitely unintelligent way to get arrested. There are better ways of keeping weed for sure. The cops sure are acting quite their orwellian selves in this case, aren't they?

[Rhythm of Life]

thats the same kind of bullshit that happened when i was in high school. but honestly your shit is on govt property so... the search was legal but i mean if our society has to resort to getting kids in trouble for smelling SMELLING like bud then forget it.

[amsterdamage]

doesn't make sense to me, it's not illegal to smell like herb
http://www.perpetualkid.com/index.as...OD&ProdID=1690

[lennyjr358]

that's BULLSHIT!
if i were that kid i would be going to court or something.
it has never been illegal to smell like weed.
why should it be grounds for suspension?
as long as there was no possesion there is no evidence.
this country is really going downhill...

[Mr. Bunglesmith]

That's fucked up. There were no drugs found, so they have no good reason to suspend him. It isn't illegal to smell like weed, just to grow, buy, sell, or posses it.