Can I be charged for using pill testing services?

Queensland has recently announced it will become the second Australian jurisdiction to offer pill testing services. This follows the lead of the ACT, which launched a permanent fixed site pill testing service last year.

The general public have a lot of questions about the nature of pill testing and how it interacts with the criminal law. Here are some of those questions, answered.

WHAT IS PILL TESTING?

Pill testing (or “drug checking”) involves taking a sample of a drug and testing the contents using forensic analysis in order to identify the contents and strength of the submitted sample.

Many party drugs, such as MDMA or cocaine, are dangerous because they contain harmful adulterants (substances different from the drug sought) or because they are of an unknown purity.