(North Dakota Monitor)-A roadside drug testing device is being added to law enforcement’s repertoire across the state as patrol units continue to clamp down on drug-impaired driving.
The SoToxa oral fluid mobile test system, similar to a Breathalyzer, will be used by up to 40 North Dakota law enforcement agencies starting this fall. The device has been used as part of a pilot program in the state to test how well it detects drugs such as marijuana, cocaine, methamphetamine and opioids.
North Dakota Highway Patrol Trooper Tarek Chase is the coordinator for the state’s drug recognition experts and heads the program for standardized field sobriety testing. He said the device would be beneficial.
“They still have to be able to utilize their appropriate field sobriety tests,” Chase told the North Dakota Monitor. “When their (sobriety) tests are showing that this person is not safe to operate a motor vehicle, but they can’t smell the odor of alcohol, or they can’t pinpoint it to alcohol being the cause, if they employ this tool, this device, it will help to confirm that for the officer.”
The test would be administered only after impaired driving was suspected and not used as a first indicator, Chase said.
“This would kinda be like a Breathalyzer, but it would be utilized for instances where the officer suspected drugs and not alcohol, or a combination,” he said.
The North Dakota Monitor reports that he pilot program involved voluntary samples from 50 probable impaired driving suspects during traffic stops between January 2022 to July 2023.
Fred Delfino, SoToxa product manager specializing in law enforcement for Abbott Toxicology, said the testing system was more than 90% accurate during the North Dakota pilot program.
“We do suggest any screening device gets confirmed in a laboratory and that’s how that project worked there in North Dakota,” Delfino said.
The vendor began selling the devices to law enforcement agencies in 2019, Delfino said. The device screens for drug use occurring within several hours, which is shorter than typical urine tests that can detect drug use occurring up to weeks earlier.
“What SoToxa is doing is giving (law enforcement) a tool to determine if that driver has recently used drugs,” he said. “Not to say they’re impaired. It’s just one of the steps in the process that they would go through.”
The device identified at least one drug in about 83% of the test cases, of which more than half identified marijuana as being present, according to a North Dakota Highway Patrol news release.
Chase said the state purchased about 40 SoToxa devices. Each device cost $4,500, according to the North Dakota Department of Transportation. The devices could be implemented in various departments across the state by the end of the year, Chase said.
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