I was charged with POM/PDP recently and hired a good lawyer. The lawyer wants me to go in for a drug & alcohol evaluation at a state certified treatment center. He seems to think that if I can pass this evaluation and then take an 8 hour class, the state will dismiss the charges. I didn’t even think that was possible, but the lawyer insists this can happen if I pass the evaluation, take the class, the case gets assigned to two of the three possible prosecutors and he asks nicely. It sounds like the evaluation includes a bunch of questionairres and then an interview with a counselor. Their website says that they require urinalysis testing in some cases. Does anyone know under what conditions they would ask for the urinalysis test? If they do ask, would it likely be at their facility or at a testing lab? Lastly, do you think this would be an observed test? I could ask my lawyer, but that doesn’t seem like a good question to ask him.

I am (or should I say was?) a chronic smoker. I have been a good boy all year (5 days) and would do anything reasonable to get this dismissed. The first day without smoke was tough, but now I am enjoying the effects of not smoking. My energy is way better and my smoker’s cough has diminished greatly. I plan to stay clean at least until this is resolved, if not permanently. I am 5′9", 135 lbs, medium metabolism. I have started power hill walking and plan to ramp this up to jogging over hilly terrain within a week. Based on past history, I figure it will take about 45 days for my system to clean out enough to pass the test naturally and maybe 30 days with dilution. I would like to stall on this for a month or so so that one of those options is viable. If not, I am wondering if substitution is an option. The last thing I want to do is fail a drug test and be stuck in drug rehabilitation for months. My next court date isn’t until the middle of February, so I think that might be okay to some extent. Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated!