THE INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF DRUG POLICY, VOL 7, NO 3 1996

EXTRA JUDICIAL REPRESSION OF DRUG USERS IN ITALY

Giancarlo Arnao, Rome, Italy

Harm reduction should not be discussed solely within a medical context. Drug problems are very often the result of illegality. In Italy, the repression of drug users is following the model of the American 'War on drugs': extra judicial sanctions like the suspensions of driving licences based on urine tests. For pharmacological reasons the test mainly endangers cannabis users. Therefore, this practice is particularly severe for young people; for many, the suspension of driving licences can result in the loss of jobs, and social deviance. The driving licence repeal is enforced without reference to driving behaviour. In order to get a licence back, a urine sample must be given three times weekly for at least one month. This procedure in particular restores sanctions against drug users that were cancelled by the 1993 referendum.

INTRODUCTION

In Italy, a new way of 'sanctioning' drug users is now becoming common. According to this practice, users do not need to be found in possession of the slightest amount of drug, they can be sanctioned for having used a drug in the past and the sanction can stem from a simple suspicion by a police officer.

The system is very simple. Instead of enforcing the drug laws, the police enforce article 128 of the 'Codice della strada' (Road Regulations). According to article 128, anybody who is 'dependent on alcohol, narcotics or psychotropic substances', or 'habitually' takes substances 'that can reduce the skill of driving'can have his or her driving licence revoked. In fact, anybody who uses alcohol, coffee, or psychoactive patent medicines can be the target of article 128. This article can be defined as an archetype of prohibitionist norms. In theory, it could be used against anybody; in practice, it allows all kinds of selective repression. One might think that article 128 is enforced by police patrols along the highways, apprehending people whilst they are driving their cars. Not at all. The police apprehend citizens at their home delivering them a printed official form: Form 3, which was distributed to every Italian police station, and reads as follows:

GIVEN that it turns out that Mr/Ms... is addicted to personal non-therapeutic use of narcotic drugs ( .... ) BELIEVING that s/he should be checked as to whether s/he is in possession of the psycho-physical attitude for driving a vehicle ( ... ) APPLYING the -art. 128 of the Road Regulations WE ORDER Mr/Ms ... to apply for a medical examination ( ... ) within the date...

In practical terms, this means that any policeman can revoke the driving licence of any citizen, unless he or she proves not to be a drug user, submitting to medical exams and drug tests in some Public Health Centre, at his or her own expenses.

Examples

What are the criteria that make a citizen liable to receive Form 3? The reply comes from the case of GPL, who is 24yearsold. According to the police station (Carabinieri) of Savigliano (Torino), GPL was considered to be a drug user, and his driving licence was revoked, because:

he usually frequents other addicts, some of whom have also had their driving licence revoked, and some others turned out to be drug users or dealers; he takes them in his own car, supposedly helping them to buy and use drugs; he frequently spends a good part of the night in the discotheques with them. (Compagnia Carabinieri di Savigliano, lir. 037053/8, 19 agosto 1994)

What happens to a citizen who receives Form 3? A typical case is the one of EB, 35 years old, from Sovigliano. EB never had drug-related legal problems and was never convicted for traffic violations. But he is known to associate with people who are supposedly drug addicts, and that is enough to be reached by the fatal Form 3. He must submit to medical exams. The urine test is negative and he finally gets his driving licence back. But it is not a 'normal' licence, which lasts 5 years but it has a limited term of 2 years, emphasised by a huge stamp on the document. This stamp can obviously be interpreted as evidence that the citizen is not 'normal', or, worse, that he has been (and could be again) a 'drug addict'. But the surprises are not over. After 2 years, in order to have his driving licence renewed, he must submit again to urine tests. And again the licence is for a limited term, again the stamp, and again urine tests after 2 years. Practically, once a citizen has been suspected of using illegal substances by a police officer, he or she is indefinitely condemned to have a 'marked' licence, and to submit to urine tests every now and then.

A different case is that of V13, aged 53, from Sorano. V13 was arrested and sentenced in 1986 for the possession of 56 grams of marihuana. Eight years later, he must renew his licence. The police send him a letter arguing that, given his previous sentence, we cannot exclude that you could make personal non-medical use of a narcotic substance'. Therefore, V13 is ordered to submit to the drug test. The test is negative. But this is not enough. V13has to apply to a SerT (Drug Treatment Centre)) for a 'psycho-diagnostic analysis'. The analysis consists of answering the 170 questions of the MMPI Minnesota 1953 Battery Test. The only pertinent question is whether he likes car magazines; but he is also questioned about the Bible, about his sexual life, and about incestuous desires towards his mother. He finally gets his licence back, but only after 6 months of running around from, office to office (for a total of 700 km).

Some peculiar features of this practice

Public health centres can be very far from where people live but in many cases the individual concerned cannot drive his or her car because he or she is without a licence. Besides, Italian public centres are generally very disorganised, and visitors must wait for hours. The whole sequence of urine tests generally lasts 4 weeks (three times a week) and cannot be interrupted. The tests must sometimes be repeated after 6 months. Therefore, the whole procedure for getting the licence back is a severe limitation of individual freedom. The degree of the limitation of freedom is in the hands of police officers and public health bureaucrats. Both generally act according to discretionary criteria. If the individual wants to stop the bureaucratic procedure, he or she can appeal, but this takes a lot of time and money.

The consequences are very heavy if the test turns out to be positive. Because THC remains in the urine up to 6 weeks, one can lose a driving licence because of a single joint taken some weeks earlier. If the person is caught while driving a vehicle, he or she is also sentenced to a fine of up to two million lire. Practically, anybody who smoked a joint some weeks earlier is punished as though he or she would be guilty of drunken driving. Heavy consequences can also follow in the case of a technical fault. CB, aged 25, from Savigliano, took a set of six THC tests: five were negative, and one was positive. CB appealed, maintaining that it was a technical mistake, she won the appeal, and got her licence back. But this happened after 8 months. In the meantime she lost her job.

The real aim of this procedure has nothing to do with the issue of safety on the road. People who are caught by Form 3 often have their licence taken away, because they allegedly took drugs many years before. Urine tests do not prove present intoxication, but drug use in the past. In some Public Health Centres (e.g. Vicenza) they use the hair test (in spite of its questionable scientific value), which can disclose drug use in the remote past. Alcohol, which is one of the leading factors of car accidents in Italy, is not even tested for. There is no reference to alcohol
in Form 3. Paradoxically, people who are submitted to medical examinations could show up completely drunk and nobody would care about it. The aim is obviously to find and punish drug users, regardless of their driving behaviour, regardless of their personal behaviour, regardless of their social integration. This procedure is a proper example of what Manderson, referring to the control system of drug users, defined as 'an expression of fury in legislative form' ( 1995 a,
p. 23 6). It is, in fact, a shame from the point of view of civil rights.

The procedure is also contradictory in respect of harm-reduction. The stamp on the licence, the requirement to take special medical examinations, the shortened term of the licence, the compulsion to submit to the test even many years after an arrest for possession of drugs, the indefinite length of the controls: all these features confirm the traditional (and still popular) stereotype about drug users: 'Once an addict, always an addict'. Moreover, the repression through the revocation of the driving licence carries out what in sociological terms is defined 'labelling'. Drug users are treated as a separate and outcast category of citizens, putting them at risk of social deviance, discrimination, loss of job opportunities, etc. Even worse, when people are punished for having any kind of contact with drug addicts, the addicts are driven to increase their social deviance, which is exactly the opposite to what we want to achieve through harm reduction strategies.

The procedure mostly involves cannabis users and therefore it can bring out other negative outcomes. The urine test reveals cannabis use up to 6 weeks back in the past; heroin and cocaine up to 72 hours. Therefore, people are encouraged to use the more dangerous substances and secondly, people are not tested for previous and/or habitual alcohol abuse (apart from the instant test given to drivers on the spot); people are therefore encouraged to substitute cannabis with alcohol.

CONCLUSION

The Form 3 procedure is now expanding in Italy. As far as we know, there are hundreds, perhaps thousands of cases. Some Public Health Centres are clogged by the flow of people applying for medical examinations related to driving licences revoked for alleged drug problems. Pat O'Hare, describing the position of Ethan Nadelmann, says that harm reduction'is about reducing the harms from drug use and the harms of drug control policies' (1995, p. 200). Therefore, the issue of extra-judicial sanction should not be underrated in the context of a harm-reduction strategy.

Dr Giancarlo Arnao, 16 Via Gaetano Sacchi, 00 153 Rome, Italy

REFERENCES

MandersonD (1995) An archaeology of drug laws. International Journal of Drug Policy 5(4): 236.

O'Hare PA0995) Editorial. International journal of Drug Policy 5W:200.