School procedures should reflect the available legal means for combating drug use. These procedures should be known to and understood by school administrators and teachers as well as students, parents, and law enforcement officials. Everyone should be aware that school authorities have broad power within the law to take full, appropriate, and effective action against drug offenders. Additional sources of information on legal issues in school drug policy are listed at the end of this handbook.
SEARCHING FOR DRUGS WITHIN THE SCHOOL
In some circumstances, the most important tool for controlling drug use is an effective program of drug searches. School administrators should not condone the presence of drugs anywhere on school property. The presence of any drugs or drug-related materials in school can mean only one thing—that drugs are being used or distributed in school. Schools committed to fighting drugs should do everything they can to determine whether school grounds are being used to facilitate the possession, use, or distribution of drugs and to prevent such crimes.
In order to institute an effective drug search policy in schools with a substantial problem, school officials can take several steps. First, they can identify the specific areas in the school where drugs are likely to be found or used. Student lockers, bathrooms, and "smoking areas" are obvious candidates. Second, school administrators can clearly announce in writing at the beginning of the school year that these areas will be subject to unannounced searches and that students should consider such areas "public" rather than "private." The more clearly a school specifies that these portions of the school's property are public, the less likely it is that a court will conclude that students retain any reasonable expectation of privacy in these places and the less justification will be needed to search such locations.
School officials should, therefore, formulate and disseminate to all students and staff a written policy that will permit an effective program of drug searches. Courts have usually upheld locker searches where schools have established written policies under which the school retains joint control over student lockers, maintains duplicate or master keys for all lockers, and reserves the right to inspect lockers at any time.[ [6] While this has not become established law in every part of the country, it will be easier to justify locker searches in schools that have such policies. Moreover, the mere existence of such policies can have a salutary effect. If students know that their lockers may be searched, drug users will find it much more difficult to maintain quantities of drugs in school.
The effectiveness of such searches may be improved with the use of specially trained dogs. Courts have generally held that the use of dogs to detect drugs on or in objects such as lockers, ventilators, or desks as opposed to persons, is not a "search" within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment.[ [7] Accordingly, school administrators are generally justified in using dogs in this way.
It is important to remember that any illicit drugs and drug-related items discovered at school are evidence that may be used in a criminal trial. School officials should be careful, first, to protect the evidentiary integrity of such seizures by making sure that the items are obtained in permissible searches, since unlawfully acquired evidence will not be admissible in criminal proceedings. Second, school officials should work closely with local law enforcement officials to preserve, in writing, the nature and circumstances of any seizure of drug contraband. In a criminal prosecution, the State must prove that the items produced as evidence in court are the same items that were seized from the suspect. Thus, the State must establish a "chain of custody" over the seized items which accounts for the possession of the evidence from the moment of its seizure to the moment it is introduced in court. School policy regarding the disposition of drug-related items should include procedures for the custody and safekeeping of drugs and drug-related materials prior to their removal by the police and procedures for recording the circumstances regarding the seizure.
Searching Students
In some circumstances, teachers or other school personnel will wish to search a student whom they believe to be in possession of drugs. The Supreme Court has stated that searches may be carried out according to "the dictates of reason and common sense."[ [8] The Court has recognized that the need of school authorities to maintain order justifies searches that might otherwise be unreasonable if undertaken by police officers or in the larger community. Thus the Court held in 1985 that school officials, unlike the police, do not need "probable cause" to conduct a search. Nor do they need a search warrant.[ [9]
Under the Supreme Court's ruling: