ALBANY, NY – A former state trooper who was fired after testing positive for amphetamines has filed a lawsuit against the State Police in an effort to get her job back.
According to the Times Union, a petition filed in state Supreme Court in Albany on behalf of Jamie R. Kasper alleges that the State Police relied on an unauthorized urine test that according to her attorneys, may have returned a false positive due to her use of over-the-counter dietary supplements.
An expert witness hired by her attorneys testified during an arbitration hearing that the test lacked the specificity to distinguish “amphetamine from structurally similar isomers found in many unregulated supplements,” and that the supplements are a well-known cause of a false-positive drug tests.
Kasper, a U.S. Army veteran, said: “Women in law enforcement face an uphill battle to succeed and advance in what has for far too long been a male-dominated profession. For nearly two decades, I worked hard to demonstrate my ability to do the job, and more than performed the duties expected of me. All I’m asking for is fair, equal treatment and to be able to return to the work that I love — protecting and serving the people of New York.”
Earlier in the year, Kasper’s attorneys filed a formal complaint asking the state inspector general’s office to investigate the handling of her case, but the office declined to do so. The complaint accused the NY State Police of applying different standards in the case because Kasper was a woman.
The complaint also accused the NY State Police hierarchy of targeting her for a random drug screening in 2024 as a retribution for a lawsuit that her husband — also a former trooper — had filed against the agency weeks earlier in an effort to have his law enforcement certification credentials reinstated.
The court petition filed by her attorneys focuses on the allegedly flawed arbitration and drug testing processes, and does not invoke arguments about her husband’s case or gender bias.
Charles W. Murphy, president of the New York State Troopers PBA said in a statement, “The facts are clear in this case. State Police leaders manipulated due process and disregarded their own internal policies to take vindictive and targeted actions against a veteran, mother, and dedicated public servant. This flies in the face of the high standards New Yorkers rightfully expect our agency to uphold. At a time when we face serious recruitment and retention challenges, the treatment of Trooper Kasper sends the absolute wrong message to individuals whose service this state desperately needs.”
Kasper is a former National Guard member who was deployed to Iraq in 2003 and 2004 as part of Operation Iraqi Freedom. She later become a state correction officer and was then sworn in as a state trooper in 2016. She said that she had a spotless record as a trooper assigned to Troop F in the Hudson Valley before the agency conducted a random drug test on her at a Kingston barracks in January 2024.
She said, “I had a spotless record. I’ve never had a drug test come into question in my entire job-related history. The system … it’s broken. It needs to be fixed. I’m just hoping that through this, it’ll shed some light, or maybe lead to some changes.”
The complaint filed with the inspector general’s office had raised questions about whether NY State Police can manipulate the “randomization” of drug tests to be able to test specific troopers. The amphetamine result could have been a “false-positive” due to her taking workout and dietary supplements, including energy drinks and other over-the-counter products she had consumed as part of her training regimen as a former amateur fitness competitor.
Her attorneys also cited an earlier case in which a male senior investigator who tested positive for a banned substance faced no discipline after telling the agency that he may have tested positive for antidepressants because he had been taking a weight-loss supplement.
The court petition filed also alleges that during an arbitration proceeding, an attorney for the state had assured Kasper and her attorney that they would not re-test the sample that had been positive, and acknowledged that the procedure used to test that sample was unauthorized. However, during an arbitration proceeded they said that the state’s attorneys “secretly” had the sample retested using another procedure that also came back positive, after agreeing they would not do that.
The court petition states, “that decision deprived [her] of the opportunity to prepare and present a meaningful defense,” adding that the NY State Police “changed its own rules mid-hearing by introducing new evidence procured through procedures forbidden by its own regulations.”
Her court petition states that the process leading up to her termination was “procedurally unfair, and unsupported by substantial evidence.” Beau Duffy, a spokesperson for the State Police said in a comment, “Jamie Kasper tested positive for a controlled substance during a random drug test and was terminated after an administrative investigation that followed all the appropriate procedures for investigating and adjudicating misconduct.
The fact that her husband separated from the New York State Police and challenged his decertification had no bearing on her selection for the drug testing, which is randomly determined, or the handling of her investigation.”
