Drug Tests Are a Public-Safety Issue : At Stake Is Police Credibility, Not Rights of Individual Officers

Police throughout the nation are grimly aware of the terrible toll exacted by drug abuse. It has ripped apart our society, destroying adults and children alike and creating an astronomical drain of taxpayer dollars.

Law-enforcement officers make wholesale arrests of traffickers and confiscate mountains of contraband and weapons, all too often at imminent risk to their own lives. Why, then, should these same courageous and dedicated public servants be required to submit to random drug testing? The answer lies in the nature of our profession; ours is one of those that directly affect the public’s safety and welfare.

Members of law enforcement exert unique authority over the citizenry. We constitutionally can deny liberty and the pursuit of happiness and, should circumstances dictate, even take life. Because of the authority that we wield to secure and maintain the peace of the community, it is essential that we retain the absolute trust of those whom we serve.

Opponents of random mandatory drug testing claim that it is a violation of the Fourth Amendment. They are wrong. It is not a Fourth Amendment issue. It is a public-safety issue. It is an issue of ensuring that those whose job performance directly affects the public safety are qualified to perform efficiently. It is no more intrusive than the requirement for periodic eye, heart and mental-health examinations that officers undergo routinely to ensure their fitness.

Transportation Secretary Elizabeth Hanford Dole recently acknowledged the need to establish the fitness of workers whose occupation involves the public’s safety when she announced her intent to require mandatory random drug testing for airline pilots and ground crews. I hope that other officials at all levels of government will follow her lead by demanding that everyone whose occupation affects public safety be tested.

I agree that mandatory testing is an intrusion on privacy. But isn’t the privacy of prospective officers invaded repeatedly, legally and without protest during the hiring process? The personal backgrounds of recruits are scrupulously investigated--without their knowledge or consent when necessary. Their physical and mental histories are examined, their finances delved into and friends and past employers consulted. The process continues in one form or another throughout their careers in the Los Angeles Police Department.

Three years ago the LAPD began to require all applicants who had passed the other qualifying phases of selection examinations to undergo urinalysis drug testing. Almost 50 men and women (4%) subsequently were rejected for employment.

Today we are planning to expand the testing process to include instances in which there is a reasonable suspicion that an employee has taken narcotics or other drugs. The same plan would have all new officers randomly submit to a blood, breath or urine test at least twice during their 18-month probation period.

I also have proposed universal random urinalysis of all police officers, with no exceptions and regardless of rank. Those tested would be chosen not by supervisors but at random by computer, and samples would be retested to ensure accuracy.

It is incongruous to counsel children against drugs, as the LAPD does in its Drug Abuse Resistance Education program (DARE), and not establish a universal drug-testing program that preserves the police officers’ rights while protecting the public’s right to know that those who enforce their laws are themselves free of illegal substances.

I am convinced that random testing is nothing more or less than another tool, albeit of limited utility, available to law enforcement to help us confront the greatest menace facing our country. How sad it is that our hope for the future lies with a generation of youngsters whose elders have betrayed them in their insane pursuit of deadly contaminants. How comfortingit must be to our enemies abroad to watch a nation’s appetite for mind-distorting euphoriants accomplishing their ends without having to fire a shot.

It is close to disgraceful for the police officers of this nation to hunker down behind the Fourth Amendment and cry that our “constitutional rights as individuals” are being violated. The public has the right to know that those who enforce their laws are themselves free of illegal substances.

While we await court decisions concerning the legality of random testing, we must make certain that our officers are able to make split-second life-and-death decisions in full possession of their faculties. The public deserves nothing less.

We are facing a major decision while this country watches. We can lead the way, or we can be hypocrites. I say, let us set an example for the nation by demonstrating that we are responsible professionals. We should assure members of the public that they can depend on those within whose hands and judgments they place their lives.

Many other Los Angeles police officers feel the same way. Every one of the 250 officers in our narcotics division not only volunteered to be tested, but demanded it. Several hundred other Los Angeles police officers have voluntarily signed petitions in support of random mandatory testing.I am proud of every one of them.

I look forward to the day when everyone who carries a badge in this country will offer that kind of support--better yet, that kind of demand. Then we can all stand proud.