Hard time for possession of ... deodorant?

October 6, 3:12 PMCivil Liberties ExaminerJ.D. Tuccille

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A Minnesota man who had been in jail since August 3 on cocaine possession charges was released after two months when laboratory tests revealed that the white powder, which was found in a deodorant container, was actually deodorant.

The time Cornelius F. Salonis served as a guest of the state will be applied to a sentence for driving while intoxicated, so all's well that ends well, right?

Not really, unless you think people should serve time for police mistakes -- expecially when it sometimes happens to the purely innocent. As Pat McDermott, assistant Blue Earth County attorney, admitted in the Salonis case, "In all the years I have done this, this has only happened one other time."

So at least one other person got hit with drug charges for a bad field test.

But the problem is more extensive than that. Just this summer, as part of his community service, Christian Phillips, of Lake Worth, Texas, delivered a basket of treats to local police. For his troubles, he was thrown in the slammer and threatened with up to 20 years in prison after a field test of the cookies revealed LSD and marijuana.

Except, as later laboratory tests revealed, there were no drugs. He was released from jail only after a pointless scare and an international cascade of nasty headlines.

And last year, Jimmy Michael Giorsetti, better known as Don Bolles, drummer for the punk band, the Germs, was tossed in the clink after a bottle of soap he was carrying tested positive for GHB, a drug popular on the rave scene. He cooled his heels for three days before accurate tests revealed that he soap was, in fact, soap.

Alarmed by the arrest, Dr. Bronner's Magic Soaps, the maker of Bolles's favorite cleaning product, bought the same field test used by Newport Beach, California, police.

"We confirmed that the test is useless when used on soap since every test came back positive," he said. "We also tested other common brands of soap including Johnson & Johnson's popular Neutrogena brand, as well as Colgate- Palmolive's popular Tom's of Maine brand, which gave the same false-positive tests as well."

"Our customers need to know now this whole soap opera is a mistake by police who tormented an innocent 50-year-old man with jail," Bronner said.

Soap tests positive for GHB? Well, that should be no surprise. After all, the popular over-the-counter medication Aleve commonly tests positive for amphetamines. In Sarasota, Florida, that landed Villis Sanders behind bars overnight.

Experts say that “false positives” are rare, but when the police department tested additional pills — including an Aleve tablet provided by the Herald-Tribune — the results were still the same:

Aleve shows up as amphetamines.

And no one knows why the test keeps getting it wrong.

In all cases, police promised that they'd look into the accuracy of the field tests that they've been using, and that, all too often, send innocent people to jail.

That's great. Maybe they could get their evaluations done before the next poor SOB goes to jail because of a police mistake.

Contact J.D.: civilliberties (at) tuccille.com