Python: Check if SQL Query contains a value

I need to check with Python if a SQL query contains a number in a list, to set a value for another var. My solution is only going into the "else" statement evrytime...

def check_failures (GID):
  conf.conn.ping  (True)
  conf.db.execute ("""SELECT failure, ID
                      FROM server
                      WHERE GID = %s;""", ( GID ))

  if conf.db.rowcount == 1:
    """
        fail_row[0]: failure
        fail_row[1]: ID
    """

    fail_row = list (conf.db.fetchone ())
    return fail_row

[...]

def check_running (running):
[..]

       MIDS = [533, 534, 535, 536, 537, 538, 539];
        fail_row = check_failures(server)
        if fail_row[1] in MIDS:
          maxfaults = 1
        else:     
          maxfaults = 5

    if not server in working and fail_row[0] <= maxfaults :

[...]