Farak admitted to being on a list of drugs while working between 2004 and her 2013 arrest. Her role was to test for the presence of illegal substances, which could be instrumental in thousands of . Out of "an abundance of caution," Kaczmarek didn't present them to the grand jury that was convened to determine whether to indict Farak. READ NEXT: Netflixs How to Fix a Drug Scandal Story: 5 Fast Facts, Sonja Farak: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know, Please review our privacy policy here: https://heavy.com/privacy-policy/, Copyright 2023 Heavy, Inc. All rights reserved. "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. Despite her status as a free woman (who has seemingly disappeared from the public eye), Farak's wrongdoings continue to make waves in the Massachusetts courts. Lets find out. To multiple courts' amazement, her incessant drug use never caught the attention of her co-workers. "Thousands of defendants were kept in the dark for far too long about the government misconduct in their cases," the ACLU and the Committee for Public Counsel Services, the state's public defense agency, wrote in a motion. In "How to Fix a Drug Scandal," a new four-part Netflix docuseries, documentary filmmaker Erin Lee Carr presents the stories of Massachusetts drug lab chemists Annie Dookhan and Sonja Farak, and . (Netflix) A former state chemist, Sonja Farak, made headlines in 2013 when she was arrested for stealing and using drugs from a laboratory. "We shouldn't be in the position of having to be saying, 'Don't close your eyes to the duration and scope of misconduct that may affect a whole lot of cases,'" the exasperated Massachusetts chief justice told prosecutors during oral arguments. Coakley did not respond to multiple requests for comment for this story. 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. The chemist, Sonja Farak, worked at the Amherst crime . a certification of drug samples in Penates case on Dec. 22, 2011. When she got married, it turned out that her wife, too, suffered from her own demons, and their collective anguish made Sonja desperate for a reprieve from this life. answered that the state considered the evidence irrelevant to any case other than Faraks.. But Ryan, who represented Penate, suspected it was more extensive. And so, when she pleaded guilty in January 2014, Farak got what one attorney called "de facto immunity." February 2013 email, to which he attached the worksheets. Officials recognized the worksheets for what they were: near-indisputable confessions. A drug chemist . 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. Together, we can create a more connected and informed world. Dookhan had seeded public mistrust in the criminal justice system, which "now becomes an issue in every criminal trial for every defendant.". At the time of Penates trial, the state Attorney Generals Office contended Faraks misdeeds dated back only as far as 2012. In Sonja Farak drug lab scandal, Mass - The Washington Post His email was one of more than 800 released with the Velis-Merrigan report. MA: A reckoning for prosecutors in drug lab scandal? - NADDI They were all rendered unacceptable. Dookhan was now spending less time at her lab bench and more time testifying in court about her results. With the Dookhan case so fresh, reporters immediately labeled Farak "the second chemist. 1. It's Boston local news in one concise, fun and informative email. Relying on an investigation conducted by state police, the judges Support GBH. After she was caught, Farak pleaded guilty to stealing drugs from the lab and was sentenced to prison time of 18 months. Her wrongdoings were exposed when unsealed cocaine and a crack pipe were found under her desk. It included information about the type of drugs she tampered with. Massachusetts prosecutors withheld evidence of corrupt state narcotics testing for months from a defendant facing drug charges, and didnt release it until after his conviction, according to newly surfaced documents and emails. 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. Kaczmarek argued for qualified immunity after she was sued by Rolando Penate, who spent five years in prison on drug charges in which the evidence in his case was tested by Farak. Despite such unequivocal findings of misconduct, the court removed language about Kaczmarek and Foster from notification letters to those whose cases have been dismissed, which will be sent out in early 2019. A second unsealed report into allegations of wrongdoing by police and prosecutors who handled the Farak evidence, overseen by retired state judges Peter Velis and Thomas Merrigan, drew less attention. 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. Two weeks after Ryans discovery, the Attorney Generals Office Drug lab cases information | Mass.gov A Powerful EHR to Manage a Thriving Practice. The Farak scandal came as the state grappled with another drug lab crisis. Without even interviewing Foster, they determined there was "no evidence" of obstruction of justice by her, by Kaczmarek, or by any state prosecutor. After high school, Sonja went on to major in biochemistry at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute in western Massachusetts. Farak signed a certification of drug samples in Penate's case on Dec. 22, 2011. Farak trabaj en el laboratorio Amherst desde el verano de 2004 y poco despus comenz a tomar las drogas del laboratorio. | Damning evidence reveals drug lab chemist Sonja Farak's addictions. In January of 2013, Sonja Farak, a chemist at a state crime lab in Massachusetts, was arrested for tampering with evidence related to criminal drug cases (Small, 2020).A year later, Farak pleaded guilty to tampering with drug evidence, theft of a controlled substance, and drug possession .She received a sentence of 18 months with 5 years of probation and was released in 2015. Powered by. Widening scandal at state drug lab in Mass. exposes opportunities for We were unable to subscribe you to WBUR Today. Kaczmarek wrote back. The number is 888-999-2881. "All Defendant had to do to honor the Plaintiffs Brady rights was to turn over copies of documents that were obviously exculpatory as to the Farak defendants or accede to one of the repeated requests from counsel, including Plaintiffs counsel, that they be permitted to inspect the evidence seized from Faraks car," Robertson wrote in her ruling. Since the takeover, the budget for all forensic labs across the state has been increased, by around twenty-five per cent. She received an email from a detective weeks after Farak's arrest containing detailed notes Farak made in conjunction with her own drug treatment, pointedly identified as "FARAK Admissions" but failed to disclose them for years. She was trying to suppress mental health issues, depression in specific, and she attempted to kill herself in high school, according to Rolling Stone. Even when she failed a post-arrest drug testprompting the lead investigator to quip to Kaczmarek, "I hope she doesn't have a stash in her house! In fall 2012, just five months before her arrest, Annie Dookhan confessed to faking analyses and altering samples in the Boston testing facility where she worked. | This not only led to people getting a reprieve from prison but also filing their own lawsuits against the injustice they had to suffer. Patrick said "the most important take-home" was that "no individual's due process rights were compromised.". Massachusetts prosecutor tied to Sonja Farak drug lab scandal 'actively But absent evidence of aggravating misconduct by prosecutors or cops, the majority ruled, Dookhan's tampering alone didn't justify a blanket dismissal of every case she had touched. Defense attorneys say withheld Farak notes implicate prosecutors - News Many more are likely to follow, with the total expected to exceed 50,000. But she worried they might be privileged as health information. In a separate opinion in October 2018, the Supreme Judicial Court also ordered the state to return most court fines and probation fees to people whose cases were dismissed; one estimate puts that price tag at $10 million. Sonja Farak worked as a chemist for the state of Massachusetts, specializing in identifying illegal substances. ordered a report on the history of her illicit behavior. High Massachusetts Lab Chemist Causes Thousands Of Drug Cases To Be Dismissed. He didn't buy her quibbling that there's a difference between an explicit lie and obfuscation by grammar. 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. Ryan then filed a Fortunately, the courts largely ignored this shallow investigation. With your support, GBH will continue to innovate, inspire and connect through reporting you value that meets todays moments. The responsibility of the mess that she created should also rest upon the shoulders of her workplace that allowed her the opportunity to indulge so freely in drugs in the first place. Netflix's latest true-crime series, How to Fix a Drug Scandal, dives deep into a shocking Massachusetts scandal, one that started in the humble confines of an underfunded drug testing lab and ended with an entire system in question. Her notes record on-the-job drug use ranging from small nips of the lab's baseline. memo, Kaczmarek told her supervisors that "Farak's admissions on her 'emotional worksheets' recovered from her car detail her struggle with substance abuse. Per her own court testimony, as shown in the docu-series, Farak started working at a state drug lab in Amherst in 2004. Her job consisted of testing drugs that have. concluded she was usually high while working in the lab for more than eight years before her arrest in January 2013 and started stealing samples seven years ago. As a teenager, she had attempted suicide. 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. And then the bigger investigation was going to be someone else.". Kaczmarek had obtained the evidence at issue while she was prosecuting Farak on state charges of tampering with evidence and drug possession. This scandal has thrown thousands of drug cases into question, on top of more than 24,000 cases tainted by a scandal involving ex-chemist Annie Dookhan at the state's Hinton Lab in Jamaica Plain. The report 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. This is the story of Farak's drug-induced wrongdoings, and it's the story of the Massachusetts Attorney General's office apparently turning a blind eye on those wrongfully convicted because of Farak's mistakes. Because of all that, it's no surprise that Farak was sent to prison in Massachusetts. Where Is Sonja Farak Now? Faraks notes also "Annie Dookhan's alleged actions corrupted the integrity of the criminal justice system, and there are many victims as a result of this," Coakley said at a press conference. Farak received a sentence of 18 months in jail and 5 years of probation. On another worksheet chronicling her struggle not to use, she described 12 of the next 13 samples assigned to her for testing as "urge-ful.". Sonja Farak pleaded guilty to stealing samples of drugs from an Amherst drug lab. This article originally appeared in print under the headline "The Chemists and the Cover-Up". "The gravity of the present case cannot be overstated," Kaczmarek wrote in her memo recommending a prison sentence of five to seven years. In the eight and a half years she worked at the Hinton State Laboratory in Boston, her supervisors apparently never noticed she certified samples as narcotics without actually testing them, a type of fraud called "dry-labbing." Farak. She recovered, made it through college and got a job as a chemist at the Amherst Crime Lab, where she tested confiscated drugs. Investigators gave that information to Kaczmarek and the state AG's office,according tohearings before thestate board that disciplines attorneys. Who Are Sonja Farak and Annie Dookhan? How to Fix a Drug Scandal True Story 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. It ultimately took a blatant violation to expose Dookhan, and even then her bosses twisted themselves in knots to hold on to their "super woman.". In a March 2013 But whether anyone investigated her conduct during a brief stint working at the state's Boston drug lab is at . 3.3.2023 4:50 PM, 2022 Reason Foundation | Despite clear indications that Farak used a variety of narcoticsher worksheets mentioned phentermine, and that vial of powdered oxycodone-acetaminophen had been found at her benchKaczmarek also proceeded as if crack cocaine were Farak's sole drug. 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. Where is Sonja Farak from How To Fix A Drug Scandal now? Who is Sonja Farak? ", The chemist, Sonja Farak, worked at the state drug lab in Amherst, Massachusetts, for more than eight years. TherapyNotes. Instead, Kaczmarek provided copies to Farak's own attorney and asked that all evidence from Farak's car, including the worksheets, be kept away from prying defense attorneys representing the thousands of people convicted of drug crimes based on Farak's work. A hearing on their motions is scheduled next month. Even before her arrest, the Department of Public Health had launched an internal inquiry into how such misconduct had gone undetected for such a long time. Each employee had a unique swipe card, but Farak simply used a physical key to get in after hours and on weekends. He recommended she lose her law license for two years; the Office of Bar Counsel later argued Kaczmarek should be disbarred. A few months before her arrest, Farak's counselor recommended in-patient rehab. GBH News Center for Investigative Reporting. The Amherst Bulletin reported that her medical records indicated that she only became addicted to drugs once she started working at the lab, in 2004. Due to the conviction, prosecutors were forced to dismiss more than . Introduction. Because the attorney general had "portrayed Farak as a dedicated public servant who was apprehended immediately after crossing the line, there was also no reasonto waste resources engaging in any additional introspection.". A year later, in October 2014, prosecutors relented, granting access to the full evidence in Farak's case to attorney Luke Ryan. The Attorney Generals Office, Velis and Merrigan and the state police declined to answer questions about the handling of the Farak evidence. Where Is Sonja Farak From Netflix's 'Drug Scandal' Doc Now? Most of the heat for thisincluding formal bar complaintshas fallen on Kaczmarek and another former prosecutor, Kris Foster, who was tasked with responding to subpoenas regarding the Farak evidence. Penate was convicted in December 2013 and sentenced to serve five to seven years. Sonja Farak: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know | Heavy.com In 2017, a different judge ruled that Foster's actions constituted a "fraud upon the court," calling the letter "deliberately misleading." 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." The worksheets, essentially counseling notes, showed that Farak had been using drugs often on the job for much longer than the attorney general's office had claimed. "I suspect that if another entity was in the mix"perhaps the inspector general or an independent investigator"the Attorney General's Office would have treated the Farak case much more seriously and would have been much more reluctant to hide the ball," Ryan writes in an email. Sonja Farak, a chemist with a longterm mental health struggle, is the catalyst of the story, but it doesn't end with her. 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. "Going to use phentermine," she wrote on another, "but when I went to take it, I saw how little (v. little) there is left = ended up not using. So, in a way, it is not from her that the queue of the blame should begin; it should be from the lab and the authorities themselves. "Whether law enforcement officials overlooked these papers or intentionally suppressed them is a question for another day.". This past Tuesday, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court filed a report saying that more than 24,000 convictions in 16,449 cases have been dismissed as a result of foul play by a former state drug lab chemist. The latest true crime offering from Netflix is the documentary series "How to Fix a Drug Scandal." It dives into the story of Sonja Farak, a chemist who worked for a Massachusetts state drug. Netflix released a new docu-series called "How to Fix a Drug Scandal." "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.". "I remember actually sitting on the stand and looking at it," Farak said of her first time swiping from evidence in a trafficking case, "knowing that I had analyzed the sample and that I had then tampered with it.". another filing. The staff in the new lab was also doubled, and the number of trainees was also increased. This was not true, as Nassif's department later conceded. She started smoking crack cocaine in 2011 and was soon using it 10 to 12 times a day. This very well could have been the end of the investigative trail but for a few stubborn defense lawyers, who appealed the ruling. The former judges and the state police officers who helped them conducted a thorough review, said Emalie Gainey, spokeswoman for Attorney General Maura Healey. Compromised drug samples often fit the definition. In her initial police interview, given at her dining room table, Dookhan said she "would never falsify" results "because it's someone's life on the line." According to a Rolling Stone piece on Farak, she struggled with depression from an early age, one that hasnt responded to medication. They wrote that Farak attempted suicide in high school and was also hospitalized while in college. As a teenager, she had attempted suicide. She consumed meth, crack cocaine, amphetamines, and LSD at the bench where she tested samples, in a lab bathroom, and even at courthouses where she was testifying. The medical records stated that she did not have an existing drug problem that was amplified by her access to more substances. "he didn't request a warrant. 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. "No reasonablejury could conclude that this evidence is not favorable.". Inwardly though, Sonja Farak was striving. She also starting dipping into police-submitted samples, a "whole other level of morality," as Farak called it during a fall 2015 special grand jury session. State prosecutors gave Farak the immunity they had declined to grant two years earlier, then asked when she started analyzing samples while high. Lab's standards on a fairly regular basis beginning in late 2004 or early 2005," the attorney general's report notes in launching its recounting of the chemist's drug-taking journey . The next month, Ryan asked again. Name. She was ar-rested for tampering with evidence while abusing narcotics at work. It features the true story of Sonja Farak, a former state drug lab chemist in Massachusetts who was arrested in 2013 for consuming the drugs she was supposed to test and tampering with the evidence to cover up her tracks. Coakley's office finally launched a criminal investigation in July 2012, more than a year after the infraction was discovered by Dookhan's supervisors. Sonja Farak, la qumica que tomaba drogas que registraba - Ahoramismo.com Kaczmarek, along with former assistant attorneys general Kris Foster and John Verner, all face possible sanctions. Not only did they not turn these documents over, but I wasnt aware that they existed, said Frank Flannery, who was the Hampden County assistant district attorney assigned to appeals following Faraks arrest. Rollins said it covers "a period of time in which either now disgraced chemist Annie Dookhan, or another convicted chemist Sonja Farak ," worked there. Discipline recommended for former assistant attorneys - Masslive During the next four years, she would periodically sober up and then relapse. 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. The attorney general's representative at these hearings was Assistant Attorney General Kris Foster, a recent hire. 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.