NSW Police overlooked scientific advice about hair sample

NSW Police overlooked scientific advice about hair sample and sacked drug-tested sergeant

Eamonn Duff  March 12 2017

 A single strand of hair that destroyed the life of a long-serving Sydney police officer has the potential to influence the future of not just the entire NSW Police Force but all workplaces across NSW.

Sergeant George Zisopoulos insists he has been wrongly dismissed due to one of his hair follicles which returned a positive drug test reading.
But while the state's top cop, Commissioner Andrew Scipione, has determined that, on the "balance of probabilities", the officer knowingly consumed drugs, scientific opinion suggests otherwise.
Leading forensic experts have cast doubts over the decision to sack Sergeant Zisopoulos, concluding there is "no evidence" the substances found on his hair were ingested and that the minute readings may have been caused by "external contamination".
ergeant Zisopoulos, who is the first NSW officer ever to have been fired based on a hair follicle test, has now taken his case to the Industrial Relations Commission. The court's ruling is set to affect the many thousands of front-line police who come into contact with illicit drugs either knowingly or unwittingly, both in the line of duty or outside work. It's possible to pick up traces of drugs in everyday settings such as public toilets, according to experts.
"I did not take drugs," Sergeant Zisopoulos insists.
"Through doing my job, which requires me to remove illegal drugs from the community, it stands to reason I would come into contact with them. The commissioner knows this. The experts have said this. And yet here I am, almost two years on, still battling to save my career and my integrity."
According to Greens police spokesperson David Shoebridge, it is not just police who should be worried about "unreliable" drug tests. "There is a real danger that this style of testing will become commonplace in other industries and the unfairness will spread," he said.

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MediNat Australia Comment: In a good drug testing policy, if there is an element of doubt there should always be a secondary test, especially if there are no metabolites present in the test like this one. It is confirmation that the original test yielded correct results, much fairer on the employee and employer.
We have heard of many workplace cases where a single test has been deemed conclusive! this cannot be the case, while tests are constantly laboratory tested for accuracy there can still be 2 fails per 20 tests under the Australian Standards (urine) they are not 100%, 100% of the time! No test is, no matter what the sales material and manufacturers say.
MediNat Australia has every batch of tests checked by a laboratory both saliva and urine to try to give the best accurate results possible. We still advise a secondary tests for non negative result!