Listen Live: Classic and Contemporary Celtic, Listen Live: Cape, Coast and Islands NPR Station, Boston nonprofit Street2Ivy is producing this generation's entrepreneurs. But she proceeded on the hunch that Farak only became addicted in the months before her arrest, and her colleagues stonewalled people who were skeptical of that timeline. Yet state prosecutors withheld Farak's handwritten notes about her drug use, theft, and evidence tampering from defense attorneys and a judge for more than a year. On a Friday afternoon in January 2013, a call came in to Coakley's office: "We have another Annie Dookhan out west.". It included information about the type of drugs she tampered with. For people with disabilities needing assistance with the Public Files, contact Glenn Heath at 617-300-3268. Dookhan's output remained implausibly high even after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Melendez-Diaz v. Massachusetts (2009) that defendants were entitled to cross-examine forensic chemists about their analysis. ", But another co-worker was suspicious, particularly since he "never saw Dookhan in front of a microscope.". Faraks therapist, Anna Kogan, wrote in her notes that Farak was worried about Nikki finding out about her addiction as well as the possible legal issues if she were ever caught. shipped nearly 300 pages of previously undisclosed materials to local prosecutors around the state. One of the reasons for the decrepit state and standard of the Amherst lab was the lack of funds. This article originally appeared in print under the headline "The Chemists and the Cover-Up". GBH News Center for Investigative Reporting. When defense lawyers asked to see evidence for themselves, state prosecutors smeared them as pursuing a "fishing expedition.". The court decided to uphold a ruling dismissing charges against the defendant, a juvenile at the time of the alleged offense identified only as Washington W. The justices didnt name his prosecutor, David Omiunu, who was identified by The Eye from other court records. May 2003 started working in Hinton drug lab p. 14. "Whether law enforcement officials overlooked these papers or intentionally suppressed them is a question for another day.". | Since her release, she has kept a low profile and managed to stay out of the public . Among the papers they seized were handwritten worksheets Farak completed for drug-abuse therapy. Looking back, it seems that Massachusetts law enforcement officials, reeling from the Dookhan case, simply felt they couldn't weather another full-fledged forensics scandal. Two detectives found Farak at a courthouse waiting to testify on an unrelated matter. Episode 2. Despite being a star child of the family, Sonja suffered from the mental illnesses that haunted her even in adulthood. 3.4.2023 8:00 AM, Reason Staff Sonja Farak (Netflix) An ex-lab chemist Sonja Farak's negligence and misdeeds shocked US when she was arrested in 2013 for stealing and using drugs from the lab where she worked. The defense bar also demanded answers on how such crucial evidence stayed buried for so long. At this point, Farakunlike Dookhandidn't admit anything. It's not as bad as Dookhan, they asserted and implied over and over. compelled release of additional drug treatment records, which indicated Farak used a variety of drugs that she stole from the lab for years. Months after Farak pleaded guilty in January 2014, Ryan filed a Two drug lab chemists' shocking crimes cripple a state's judicial system and blur the lines of justice for lawyers, officials and thousands of inmates. | Thus, only defendants whose evidence she tested in the six-month window before her arrest could challenge their cases. Chemist Sonja Farak pleaded guilty to "tampering with evidence" back in 2014 and was sentenced to 18 months in prison. At the very least, we expected that we would get everything they collected in their case against Farak. Flannery, now in private practice, said the substance abuse worksheets are clearly relevant to defendants challenging Faraks analysis. It contained substances often used to make counterfeit cocaine, including soap, baking soda, candle wax, and modeling clay, plus lab dishes, wax paper, and fragments of a crack pipe. Joseph Ballou, lead investigator for the state police, called them the most important documents from the car. When the Farak scandal erupted, that misconduct came into view. When Farak was arrested,former Attorney General Martha Coakley told the public investigators believed Farak tampered with drugs at the lab for only a few months. Terms Of Use, (Annie Dookhan (left) and Sonja Farak, Associated Press). Thanks to Farak's testimony and those diary worksheets, we now know that, soon after joining the Amherst lab in 2004, Farak started skimming from the methamphetamine "standard," an undiluted oil used as a reference against which suspected meth samples are compared. The special hearing officer found Kaczmarek "displayed no remorse" and was "not candid" during the disciplinary proceedings. email highlighted in the Velis-Merrigan report. The cocaine, found in an unsealed, completed drug-testing kit, tested negativemeaning Farak had seemingly replaced the formerly "positive" drugs with falsified substances. State police took these worksheets from Farak's car in January 2013, the same day they arrested her for tampering with evidence and for cocaine possession. In 2014, former Amherst drug lab chemist Sonja Farak was convicted and sentenced to 18 months in prison after it was discovered that she stole and used drugs that she was entrusted to test. Since then, she has kept a low profile. Farak trabaj en el laboratorio Amherst desde el verano de 2004 y poco despus comenz a tomar las drogas del laboratorio. The court also dismissed all meth cases processed at the lab since Farak started in 2004. The former judges and the state police officers who helped them conducted a thorough review, said Emalie Gainey, spokeswoman for Attorney General Maura Healey. Shown results suggesting otherwise, she copped to contaminating samples "a few times" during the previous "two to three years.". According to the notes, Farak thought it gave her energy, helped her to get things done and not procrastinate, feel more positive., Her partner Nikki Lee testified before a grand jury that she herself had tried cocaine, that she had observed Farak using cocaine in 2000, and that she had marijuana in her house when police officers arrived to search the premises as part of their investigation of Farak., In Faraks testimony during a grand jury investigation, she said that she became a recreational drug user during graduate school and used cocaine, marihuana, and ecstasy. She also said she used heroin one time and was nervous and sick and hated every minute of it [and had] no desire to use [it] again., Farak met and settled down with Nikki Lee in her 20s. The civil lawsuit was one of the last tied to prosecutors' disputed handling of the case against disgraced ex-chemist Sonja Farak, who was convicted in 2014 of ingesting drug samples she was. 2023 Cinemaholic Inc. All rights reserved. Foster, now general counsel at the Massachusetts Alcoholic Beverages Control Commission, and Kaczmarek, now a clerk magistrate in Suffolk Superior Court, declined to comment for this story. Her access to evidence was not restricted, and she continued testifying in court. "No reasonablejury could conclude that this evidence is not favorable.". Another three days later, state police conducted a full search of Farak's workstation, finding a vial of powder that tested positive for oxycodone, plus 11.7 grams of cocaine in a desk drawer. With the lab's ample drug supply, she was able to sneak the drug each day from a jug that resided in the shared workspace. El 6 de enero de 2014, Farak se declar culpable de los cargos en su contra. She started doing drugs almost as soon as she took the job at Amherst, but it was after years of negligence on her superiors part that her actions finally came to light. Gioia called for evidentiary hearings so prosecutors can be asked about what they knew, when they knew it, and what they did with their knowledge., Luke Ryan, Penates trial lawyer, said that the state police officers working on the report failed to obtain an appropriate understanding of the events that transpired before they were assigned to this investigation.". "I dont know how the Velis report reached the conclusion it did after reviewing the underlying email documents, said Randy Gioia, deputy chief counsel at the Committee for Public Counsel Services, the states public defender office. Release year: 2020. Grand Jury Transcript - Sonja Farak - September 16, 2015 Contributed by Shawn Musgrave (Musgrave Investigations) p. 1. | According to an Attorney General Offices report, Farak attended Temple University in Philadelphia for graduate school, which is where she became a recreational drug user. Compromised drug samples often fit the definition. You can try, Suspensions and a reprimand proposed for prosecutors admonished in drug lab scandal. Sonja Farak. Damning evidence reveals drug lab chemist Sonja Farak's addictions. The surveillance of the chemists as well as the standards and the confiscated drugs has also been increased considerably. It's Boston local news in one concise, fun and informative email. This was not true, as Nassif's department later conceded. The story of the intertwining Farak and Penate evidence began in January 2013, when state police arrested Farak and searched her car. "As the gatekeeper to this evidence, she failed to turn over documents, and she adamantly opposed the requests for access. She received the American Institute of Chemists Award in her final year as well as a Crimson and Gray Award from the school a year before, which recognized her dedication, commitment and unselfishness in the enrichment of student life at WPI. A Rolling Stone piece on Farak also indicated that she graduated with high distinction from the Worcester Polytechnic Institute. "It was Defendant who had the responsibility within the AGO [attorney general's office] to see that the Farak investigation materials were disseminated to the DAOs [district attorneys' offices]," Robertson wrote, adding there is no evidence anyone from the attorney general's office sent the potentially exculpatory evidence to those offices.". A scandal erupts, raising questions for the thousands of defendants in her cases. Investigators either missed or declined opportunities to dig very deep. Having barely investigated her, prosecutors indicted Farak only for the samples in her possession the day she was caught. Sonja Farak, a state forensic chemist in western Massachusetts, was minutes away from testifying in a drug case in early 2013 when attorneys learned she was about to be arrested on charges of. She had been accused of intentional infliction of emotional distress in addition to the conspiracy to violate [Penates] civil rights.. (Featured Image Credit: Mass Live). Fortunately, the courts largely ignored this shallow investigation. The Amherst lab had called state police when the two missing samples were noticed in 2013. Together, we can create a more connected and informed world. She had unrestricted access to the evidence room. | The governor didn't appoint the inspector general or anyone else to determine how long Farak was altering samples or running analyses while high. But she insisted the drugs didn't compromise her worka belief that one judge would aptly declare "belies logic.". But Ryan, who represented Penate, suspected it was more extensive. Judge Kinder denied Ryans motion. If they'd kept digging, defendants might still have learned the crucial facts. Powered by. Maybe fatigue made them sloppy, or perhaps they actively chose to look the other way as evidence piled up about the enormity of Farak's crimes. Even though Farak found a job after graduation and was settled down with her partner, she continued to struggle with depression and felt like a stranger in her body. Since the takeover, the budget for all forensic labs across the state has been increased, by around twenty-five per cent. Before her sentencing, Farak failed a drug test while out on bail, according to Mass Live. Even the master's degree on her rsum was fabricated. Defense lawyers doubled down on challenges to every case she might have taintednot just her own, which district attorneys ultimately agreed to dismiss, but also her co-workers', based on Farak's admission that she stole from other chemists' samples. The report Penate argued the court should follow those findings. Sonja Farak in How to Fix a Drug Scandal. Another worksheet had the month and weekdays for December 2011, which police easily could have determined by cross-referencing holidays or looking up a New England Patriots game mentioned in one entry. As a teenager, she had attempted suicide. One reason that didn't happen, he says: "the determination Coakley and her team made the morning after Farak's arrest that her misconduct did not affect the due process rights of any Farak defendants." They were all rendered unacceptable. "Forensic evidence is not uniquely immune from the risk of manipulation," Justice Antonin Scalia wrote for the majority. Here are those forms with the admissions of drug use I was talking about," a state police sergeant wrote to Assistant Attorney General Anne Kaczmarek, who led Faraks prosecution, in a "The need to inform defendants of government misconduct does not disappear when that misconduct was committed by a government lawyer as opposed to a government chemist.". It was. Process Notes/Psychotherapy Notes Process notes are sometimes also referred to as psychotherapy notesthey're the notes you take during or after a session. Coakley did not respond to multiple requests for comment for this story. Farak also had an apparent obsession for her therapists husband, as she was reported to have a folder that shed put together about him, documenting her obsession. Hearings could help decide how many of thousands of convictions tainted by Farak's testing may be overturned. Episode 1. Obviously, after a blunder of such scale, no one would want their samples checked from the same lab. This is the story of Farak's drug-induced wrongdoings, and it's the. From the March 2019 issue, "Tried to resist using @ work, but ended up failing," the forensic chemist scribbled on a diary worksheet she kept as part of her substance abuse therapy. Penate's lawsuit, which seeks $5.7 million in damages, is believed to be one of the last remaining suits tied to the scandals; the statute of limitations to file such suits has expired. Regarding the cases that she had handled, the Massachusetts courts threw out every case in the Amherst lab during her tenure. "It would be difficult to overstate the significance of these documents," Ryan wrote to the attorney general's office. Because of all that, it's no surprise that Farak was sent to prison in Massachusetts. The prosecutors have been tied to the drug lab scandal involving disgraced former state chemist Sonja Farak, who admitted to stealing and using drugs from an Amherst state lab. She was trying to suppress mental health issues, depression in specific, and she attempted to kill herself in high school, according to Rolling Stone. When a Therapy Session starts, the software automatically creates a To-Do list item reminding users to create the relevant documentation. Thank you! Nassif considered it a lapse in judgment, but not a disqualifying one; Nassif's boss didn't think it necessary to alert the prosecutors whose cases relied on the samples, much less the defendants. This not only led to people getting a reprieve from prison but also filing their own lawsuits against the injustice they had to suffer. Get all the latest from Sanditon on GBH Passport, How one Brookline studio helps artists with disabilities thrive. Dookhan was now spending less time at her lab bench and more time testifying in court about her results. As he leafed through three boxes of evidence, he found the substance abuse worksheets and diaries. Kaczmarek quoted the worksheets in a memo to her supervisor, Verner, and others, summarizing that they revealed Farak's "struggle with substance abuse." T he day Sonja Farak's world unraveled - the day a crack pipe and sliced evidence bags of cocaine were found at her workstation - started like many others: she attended court. Most important, they found seven worksheets from Farak's substance abuse therapy. In four 50-minute episodes, Netflix's latest shocker tells the story of Sonia Farak, a chemist who worked at a crime lab in Amherst, Massachusetts. Soon after Dookhan's arrest, Coakley's office asked the governor to order a broader independent probe of the Hinton lab. I felt euphoric, Kogan wrote of Farak. In worksheet notes dated Thursday, Dec. 22, Farak wrote she "tried to resist using @ work, but ended up failing." Although the year she wrote the notes wasn't listed . Farak had started taking drugs on the job within months of joining the Amherst lab in 2004. To better estimate how many convictions will have to be reviewed because of Farak, the Supreme Judicial Court Tens of thousands of criminal drug cases were dismissed as a result of misconduct by Dookhan and Farak. 3.3.2023 5:30 PM, Joe Lancaster ", Prosecutors maintained that Faraks rogue behavior spanned just a few months. Sonja Farak, who worked as a chemist at the Amherst drug lab since 2004, was arrested in January 2013 after one of her co-workers noticed samples were missing from evidence. After Faraks arrest in 2013, police found pages of mental health worksheets in her car indicating she'd struggled with drug addiction since at least 2011. Foster protested that portions of the evidentiary file in question might be privileged or not subject to disclosure. In the aftermath, the court felt it necessary to make clear that "no prosecutorhas the authority to decline to disclose exculpatory information.". Sonja Farak pleaded guilty to stealing samples of drugs from an Amherst drug lab. Sonja Farak stole, ingested or manufactured drugs almost every day for eight years while working as a chemist at a state lab in Amherst, Massachusetts. The Farak documents indicate she used drugs on the very day she certified samples as heroin in Penates case. Farak received a sentence of 18 months in jail and 5 years of probation. Velis said he stood by the findings. mentioned a New England Patriots game on Saturday, Dec. 24 which corresponded with a game date in 2011. After the Supreme Court's decision, a skeptical colleague started tracking how many microscope slides Dookhan used to test samples for cocaine. After graduating from Portsmouth High School, Farak attended the Worcester Polytechnic Institute, where she got a bachelor of science degree in biochemistry in 2000. In the series, it's explained that Farak loved the energy the meth gave her. Without access to the diaries, the Springfield judge in 2013 found that Farak had starting stealing from samples in summer 2012. Meier put the number at 40,323 defendants, though some have called that an overestimate. In court, she added that there was "no smoking gun" in the evidence. Farak worked for the Amherst Drug Lab in Massachusetts for 9 years when she was convicted of stealing and using them. There is nothing to indicate that the allegations against Farak date back to the time she tested the drugs in Penates case. As the state's top court put it, the criminal investigation into Farak was "cursory at best.". Why Won't Maryland Sell Me a Goddamn Beer? Asked for comment, Foster in January objected through an attorney that the judge never gave her an opportunity to defend herself and that his ruling left an "indelible stain on her reputation.". Among other items, Kaczmarek But in a Dookhan's transgressions got more press attention: Her story broke first, she immediately confessed, and her misdeeds took place in big-city Boston rather than the western reaches of the state. A final decision is still pending and must be approved by the state Supreme Judicial Court. Scalia may as well have been describing Dookhan. The Hinton drug lab, operated by the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, appears to have been run largely on the honor system. Sonja Farak worked as a chemist for the state of Massachusetts, specializing in identifying illegal substances. Among the papers they seized were handwritten worksheets Farak completed for drug-abuse therapy. Instead, Kaczmarek proceeded as if the substance abuse was a recent development. They were found with their packaging sliced open and their contents apparently altered. The medical records stated that she did not have an existing drug problem that was amplified by her access to more substances.
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