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Because of all that, it's no surprise that Farak was sent to prison in Massachusetts. motion on behalf of another client to see the evidence. Because she did so, Plaintiff served more than five years in a state prison.". Her answer: more than eight years before her arrest. Joseph Ballou, lead investigator for the state police, called them the most important documents from the car. The hotline is open Monday through Friday, from 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. In 2019, she was seen leaving the Springfield Federal Court but declined to comment on the status of the case. Powered by. As the state's top court put it, the criminal investigation into Farak was "cursory at best.". Penate is seeking a new trial, contending the conviction should be reversed because of prosecutorial misconduct and evidence tainted by Farak. 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 . Faraks wife had her own mental health problems, and according to Rolling Stone, Farak would have conflict with her wife every night at home. Instead, she submitted an intentionally vague letter to the judge claiming defense attorneys already had everything. After serving for 13 months, she was released on parole in 2015. Investigators either missed or declined opportunities to dig very deep. 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. 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. 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. Though. 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. The cocaine, found in an unsealed, completed drug-testing kit, tested negativemeaning Farak had seemingly replaced the formerly "positive" drugs with falsified substances. After her arrest, she received support from her parents, who showed up to her court appearances, the Daily Hampshire Gazette reported. "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. Sonja Farak is at the center of Netflix's new true crime docuseries, How To Fix a Drug Scandal. Sonja Farak worked as a chemist for the state of Massachusetts, specializing in identifying illegal substances. In addition to ordering the dismissal of many thousands of cases, the Supreme Judicial Court directed a committee to draft a "checklist" for prosecutors, clarifying their obligation to turn over evidence to defendants. "A forensic analyst responding to a request from a law enforcement official may feel pressureor have an incentiveto alter the evidence in a manner favorable to the prosecution.". 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. Damning evidence reveals drug lab chemist Sonja Farak's addictions. Scalia may as well have been describing Dookhan. She started seeing a substance abuse therapist around this time. It didnt matter whether or not she was the one who did the testing or some other chemist. In fall 2013, a Springfield, Massachusetts, judge convened hearings with the explicit aim of establishing "the timing and scope" of Farak's "alleged criminal conduct.". We were unable to subscribe you to WBUR Today. Sonja Farak, a chemist with a longterm mental health struggle, is the catalyst of the story, but it doesn't end with her. A hearing on their motions is scheduled next month. "These drugswere tested fairly," Coakley claimed the day after Farak's arrest. Months after Farak pleaded guilty in January 2014, Ryan filed a During her trial, her defense lawyer Elaine Pourinski said that Farak wasnt taking drugs to party, but instead to control her depression. How to Fix a Drug Scandal: With Shannon O'Neill, Karl Kenzler, Paul Solotaroff, Scott Allen. Gov. But she insisted the drugs didn't compromise her worka belief that one judge would aptly declare "belies logic.". Sonja Farak pleaded guilty to stealing samples of drugs from an Amherst drug lab. Like Hinton, the Amherst lab had no cameras. She first worked at the Hinton State Laboratory in Jamaica Plain for a year as a bacteriologist working on HIV tests before she transferred to the Amherst Lab for drug analysis. Farak as a young. The chemist, Sonja Farak, worked at the state drug lab in Amherst, Massachusetts, for more than eight years. 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 Netflixs How to Fix a Drug Scandal Story: 5 Fast Facts. In 2009, Farak branched out to the lab's amphetamine, phentermine, and cocaine standards. After contemplating another suicide, she settled on drugs, and the fact that she had such easy access to it at her workplace made it easier for her to get lost in that world. 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. The place was closed as soon as Faraks crimes came to light. It was an astoundingly light touch for the second state chemist arrested in six months. Follow us so you don't miss a thing! 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. Fortunately, the courts largely ignored this shallow investigation. At the time of Penates trial, the state Attorney Generals Office contended Faraks misdeeds dated back only as far as 2012. 2023 Cinemaholic Inc. All rights reserved. Foster protested that portions of the evidentiary file in question might be privileged or not subject to disclosure. Her notes record on-the-job drug use ranging from small nips of the lab's baseline standard stock of the stimulant phentermine to stealing crack not only from her own samples but from colleagues' as well. Former chemist Annie Dookhan was convicted in 2013 on charges of improperly testing drug evidence at a drug lab in Boston. As a teenager, she had attempted suicide. Privacy Policy | The fact that she ran analyses while high and regularly dipped into samples casts doubt on thousands of convictions. 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. She started smoking crack cocaine in 2011 and was soon using it 10 to 12 times a day. The disgraced chemist was sentenced to less than two years behind bars in 2014, following her guilty pleas for stealing cocaine from the lab. 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. How to Fix A Drug Scandal takes a one-woman issue in a crumbling police drug lab and follows the way it blew up an entire legal system. . GBH News Center for Investigative Reporting. That settlement awaits approval by a judge. There is no allegation of misconduct against the local prosecutors who presented the case against Penate in Hampden County Superior Court. 3.4.2023 8:00 AM, Reason Staff 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. Hearings could help decide how many of thousands of convictions tainted by Farak's testing may be overturned. The court also dismissed all meth cases processed at the lab since Farak started in 2004. Foster Ryan finally viewed the file in the attorney generals offices in October 2014. Farak saw Kogan in 2009 and 2010, and her therapist wrote: She obtains the drugs from her job at the state drug lab, by taking portions of samples that have come in to be tested., Kogan also wrote that Farak told her she had taken methamphetamines at another lab in an old job, but she didnt get much from it. Kogan wrote that after moving to western [Massachusetts] for her job at the state drug lab, [Farak] tried it again and really liked it. May 2003 started working in Hinton drug lab p. 14. The report wrote she "tried to resist using @ work, but ended up failing." For years, Sonja Farak was addicted to cocaine, methamphetamine, and amphetamines, the kind of drugs usually bought from street dealers in covert transactions that carry the constant risk of arrest. Two detectives found Farak at a courthouse waiting to testify on an unrelated matter. Grand Jury Transcript - Sonja Farak - September 16, 2015 Contributed by Shawn Musgrave (Musgrave Investigations) p. 1. Foster consulted Kaczmarek about the files contents, according to an Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Accessibility at GBH, Transparency in Coverage Cost-Sharing Disclosures. At least 11,000 cases have already been dismissed due to fallout from the scandal, with thousands more likely to come. "I was totally controlled by my addiction," Farak later testified. Release year: 2020. 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. Each employee had a unique swipe card, but Farak simply used a physical key to get in after hours and on weekends. They say court records and newly released emails show prosecutors sat on evidence they were familiar with that pointed to Faraks drug use in 2011, when she worked on Penates case. Biden Embraces the Fearmongering, Vows To Squash D.C.'s Mild Criminal Justice Reforms, The Flap Over Biden's Comment About 2 Fentanyl Deaths Obscures Prohibition's Role in Causing Them, Conservatives Turn Further Against WarExcept Maybe With Mexico. Coakley's office finally launched a criminal investigation in July 2012, more than a year after the infraction was discovered by Dookhan's supervisors. ", The chemist, Sonja Farak, worked at the state drug lab in Amherst, Massachusetts, for more than eight years. 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. As Solotaroff recounts in detail, Massachusetts attorney Luke Ryan represented two people who were accused of drug charges that Farak had analyzed . Joseph . Patrick said "the most important take-home" was that "no individual's due process rights were compromised.". Its no big deal, 14-year-old Farak said to the Panama City News Herald. 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. "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. 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. Dookhan had seeded public mistrust in the criminal justice system, which "now becomes an issue in every criminal trial for every defendant.". Disgraced drug lab chemist Sonja Farak emerges as her own attorney as defendant in $5.7 million federal lawsuit. In June 2011, Dookhan secretly took 90 samples out of an evidence locker and then forged a co-worker's initials to check them back in, a clear chain-of-custody breach. | The former judges and the state police officers who helped them conducted a thorough review, said Emalie Gainey, spokeswoman for Attorney General Maura Healey. This threw every sample she had ever tested into question. Over time, Farak's drug use turned to cocaine, LSD and, eventually, crack. Deborah Becker Twitter Host/ReporterDeborah Becker is a senior correspondent and host at WBUR. Reporting for this story was supported by the Fund for Investigative Journalism. 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. Since her release, she has kept a low profile and managed to stay out of the public . In Farak's car, police found a "works kit"crack cocaine, a spatula, and copper mesh, often used as a pipe filter. Penate was convicted in December 2013 and sentenced to serve five to seven years. Ryan then filed a 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. She married Lee after starting her job, but their marriage was rocky. Carr weaves Farak's story into that of another Massachusetts chemist, Annie Dookhan, who worked across the state at the Hinton drug lab in Boston. Verner, who testified that he didn't "micromanage" Kaczmarek, escaped criticism. She tried to kill herself in high school, according to Rolling Stone. Sgt. Read More: Where is Sonja Farak Sister Now? ", In 2004, her first full year at the lab, Dookhan reported analyzing approximately 700 samples per month. The lawsuit names Kaczmarek, Farak and three members of the state police. The results of that intake interview and notes from several of Farak's therapists all detailing Farak's drug use going back years were obtained by defense attorneys on behalf of . Farak wasn't the first Massachusetts chemist to tamper with drug evidence. Without access to the diaries, the Springfield judge in 2013 found that Farak had starting stealing from samples in summer 2012.

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