On duty drug use.

[Guest]

You might call me a conservative. I beleive that people should be imprisoned for long periods of time and/or the death penalty for drugs.

Recently I changed jobs and I have been DISGUSTED with the other employees using drugs on the job. Bear with me, I'll explain it all: on my commute to my job site, I stopped by another job site to see the guard who works there and how he was doing. He was sleeping. I reported this the on call supervisor. The guard still works there. The suoervisor said they can't find anyone else to replace his shift....so oh well. Ok.

So yesterday, I see my replacment come in at the end of shift and he was all glossy eyed. I confronted him and he said that he passed the drug test and that I was making a big deal out of nothing. So I reported him and guess what the supervisor told me? "He passed the drug test, what do you want me to do about it?"

I am getting fed up. What should I do? thanks

[Lawson]

Being glossy eyed does not automatically = drug use.

[Chucky]

Being glossy eyed does not automatically = drug use.

I have allergies and people will sometimes ask me if all is ok. Glossy or red eyes in our line of work are as common as a cop in a donut shop.

[gcmc security part 2]

We had an officer get busted for smoking weed on the job. A deputy stopped by to make sure she was ok and lo and behold there she was. She was a 54 y/o lady!

[craig333]

Long jail terms or even the death penalty? Yes I'd say you go beyond conservative. Sorry, I know too many substance abusers who managed to turn things around are now productive tax paying citizens.

As for worrying about this person being your backup or whatever, I do sympathize, but I'm usually too concerned about the guy backing me up who is either too stupid or too fat or some other combination of things. We either deal with it or quit and hope the next job we'll be a quality officer to work with. Good luck.

[HotelSecurity]

I am 51 years old. I have never been drunk. I have never taken a puff on a cigarette of any kind. Yet I think you calling for the death penalty is a little over the top.

[bpdblue]

How far would you go?

Would you want to execute me because I took 3 asprins when the recommended dose was 2?

I am a pretty conservative person myself, who as a recently (less than a year ago) retired police officer with over 23+ years on the force (plus 3+ more years as a reserve police officer), can say that I never saw someone who deserved the DEATH penalty for their only offense being their use of drugs.

Now if they killed someone while they were under the influence, or maybe even got children addicted to drugs, I could consider life without the possibility of parole, or death.

But, when you make a blanket statement about drugs and the death penalty, you have Really stepped over the line.

[NRM_Oz]

Ok I am anti-drugs (ie. narcotics) but it has been said about those who may be under an influence of say alcohol, fatigue caused by insomnia, personal problems at home coming to work or even a simple cough or cold are a risk to not only yourself but to your team.

Moons ago, I was taught that YOU as an employee need to ensure you are fit and well on duty and often I have been sick with a cough but had a few swigs from a cough medicine bottle to keep going during my shift. I note everything I have had 12 hours prior to my shift due to my self management but just in case something happened to me and there is a record of what I had consumed. Also if I was armed and breath tested, I would be subject to a record of consumption of cough mixture that may give a false reading.

So for those tokers, pill poppers and those who come to work with a hangover or who just abuse their time off before a long shift ............ yes they are a danger to themselves and a danger to others as well - including yourself. If you are unhappy working with someone for certain reasons speak up and explain why but expect repercussions too. I had someone report me and make a false statement on a site and it backfired when he bragged too much to other staff and was fired for making a BS statement.

[ddog]

Taking a medicidal herb used before Bible times, which is beneficial and never factually had anything proven wrong against it except paranoia from propoganda is the least of your worries.

SO's doing and selling meth and crack should be more of your worries. They are edgey, totally distracted, preoccupied, and would kill your mother (repeatedly) to take a 20 minute break every 30 minutes to either do their highly addictive drugs or sell them (to anyone including children) to support their habbits.

Red eyes may actually be better than a significant majority of SO population's normal health and mental states on the average. Even alcohol and cigarettes are far worse than your idea of 'drugs' which is red eyes or 'pot'; so your brainwashed 'death penalty' scares me worse than red eyes could ever do from any number of people.

[SecTrainer]

As a conservative myself, first I wish to clarify that your position regarding punishment for drug use isn't a "conservative" position at all, that I am aware of, so I'd appreciate your not characterizing it that way. It's not even an "extreme right-wing" position - it's just extreme, to say nothing of impractical and cynical.

Security officers ought not to be committing crimes of any kind, for sure - especially on duty. With that said, however, there are lots of perfectly innocent reasons that a person might have "red eyes", "glossy eyes", "dilated pupils", "pinpoint pupils", etc. This is why we do drug testing, as imperfect as that might be.

Whether drugs are involved or not, your interest in another employee's physical condition on duty (assuming you are not a supervisor) should probably be confined to the sole question of whether or not their condition is impaired (for whatever reason) to the point that it adversely impacts the security of the site and/or the performance of your own duties. In such case, you would report this situation WITHOUT attempting to "diagnose" the reason for the impairment. In other words, you would report that their condition was impaired HOW, but without speculations as to WHY it is impaired.

Of course, if you were to directly observe the presence or use of illicit drugs, that would certainly also be reportable just as it would be if you observed a fellow officer commit a theft or damage property.

Otherwise, become less focused on others and more focused on your own performance, which is your direct area of concern and which, as is true for all of us, will always provide sufficient opportunity for improvement to keep you plenty busy.

[Contact]

I think some of you may be jumping the original posters butt a little hastily. I think his method of punishment is a little over the top, yes. At the same time I share his frusteration of doing as good of a job as he can do, only to be relieved by someone who is making just as much as he is, without any of the effort or initative, and not only that, but the person is actually committing crime while on the job!!

bpdblue, three asprin instead of two is not what we're talking about, and you know it.

Now Timothy, if you are that concerned with the conduct of your fellow guards, I think it is time for you to depart your position from the company. OTOH, if you do not directly work with them, and they are not your backup, and your supervisors don't do anything about it, but you otherwise enjoy the job itself, maybe you should back off and let your supervisors deal with it. They're only making theirselves look bad AND making you look better at the same time. If you're ballsy enough, start writing in your shift report logs that "Relief guard appeared impaired, notified supervisor, was told to change shift as per schedule." and leave it at that. Cover your butt.

[NRM_Oz]

I have investigated peolpe for finding a small amount at work and I have investigated people for selling it at work and believe me - they are as guilty as each other. What someone does in their own time does not affect me provided they stay inside their homes, do not drive or roam the streets or affect my life or my person whilst doing such things.

With the exception of caffeine (let's be realistic here), too much of anything is going to affect you (exclude nicotine as it will just make you thirsty and sick) and those people who have no respect for their colleagues to come on shift under the influence or even with a high fatigue factor may as well be playing Russian Roulette with you. There are some factors that cannot be helped including no rest due to sick family members or a new baby (I am sue those with kids can tell me about this) or something personal has affected your mental state (death, financial, family, etc).

Where I worked 1 contract, it was a transport company and EVERYONE was subject to drug and alcohol testing at random or targetted. 1 character was over 100 times the safe working limit and he had been given 4 sessions on 4 prior failed tests but just did not care that being a truck driver - he could just float away. The costs of someone like this having an accident, killing someone or destroying property is through the roof ... so who pays for this ?