State chemist may have affected more drug cases than previously known What Happened To Sonja From Netflix Drug Scandal Series - Refinery29 . What Netflix's How To Fix a Drug Scandal didn't tell you - Esquire Lost in the high drama of determining which individual prosecutors hid evidence was a more basic question: In scandals like these, why are decisions about evidence left to prosecutors at all? 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. His report deemed Dookhan the "sole bad actor" at the lab, a finding that remains disputed in some circles. The justices ordered Healey's department to cover all costs of notifying all defendants whose cases were dismissed. 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. With the Dookhan case so fresh, reporters immediately labeled Farak "the second chemist. She started working shortly after for the Massachusetts Department of Public Health in July 2003 until July 2012, and from July 2012 until January 2013 for the Massachusetts State Police when the lab fell under their jurisdiction. 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." Even as they filed numerous motions for information about how long Farak had been using drugs, the defense attorneys had no idea these worksheets existed. Reporting for this story was supported by the Fund for Investigative Journalism. Shawn Musgrave is a reporter who was until recently based in Boston. Both have since left the attorney general's office for other government positions. There is no allegation of misconduct against the local prosecutors who presented the case against Penate in Hampden County Superior Court. Several defense attorneys who called for the Velis-Merrigan investigation say the former judges and their state police investigators got it wrong. 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. The disgraced chemist was sentenced to less than two years behind bars in 2014, following her guilty pleas for stealing cocaine from the lab. 2023 Cinemaholic Inc. All rights reserved. Farak signed a certification of drug samples in Penate's case on Dec. 22, 2011. "he didn't request a warrant. NORTHAMPTON Sonja J. Farak told a nurse at the Western Massachusetts She stopped the interview when asked about crack pipes found at her bench, and state police towed her car back to barracks while they waited on a warrant. El 6 de enero de 2014, Farak se declar culpable de los cargos en su contra. Did Falsified Drug Tests Lead to Wrongful Convictions? - Rolling Stone "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.". 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. compelled release of additional drug treatment records, which indicated Farak used a variety of drugs that she stole from the lab for years. Massachusetts DA seeks to vacate thousands of drug convictions - CNN Farak apparently still tested each caseunlike Annie Dookhan, another Massachusetts chemist who was arrested five months prior to Farak for fabricating test results. Joseph . Where Are How to Fix a Drug Scandal's Sonja Farak and Kris - Decider 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. She later called this dismissive exchange a "plea to God.". Sonja Farak: Prosecutors kept drug abuse evidence secret so - MEAWW It's not as bad as Dookhan, they asserted and implied over and over. Damning evidence reveals drug lab chemist Sonja Farak's addictions. Her role was to test for the presence of illegal substances, which could be instrumental in thousands of . And when defense attorneys tried to do it themselves, Coakley's office blocked their efforts. Sonja Farak is in the grip of a rubbed-raw depression that hasn't responded to medication. 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. She couldn't be sure which cases these were, Dookhan told investigators. 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. A federal judge has rejected claims from an embattled former state prosecutor that she is protected from liability in the fallout over a Massachusetts drug lab scandal. Despite being a star child of the family, Sonja suffered from the mental illnesses that haunted her even in adulthood. Farak admitted in testimony that she began using drugs almost as soon as she started working at the Massachusetts State Crime Lab in Amherst. 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 . Without even interviewing Foster, they determined there was "no evidence" of obstruction of justice by her, by Kaczmarek, or by any state prosecutor. In the series, it's explained that Farak loved the energy the meth gave her. On a Friday afternoon in January 2013, a call came in to Coakley's office: "We have another Annie Dookhan out west.". 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. The cocaine, found in an unsealed, completed drug-testing kit, tested negativemeaning Farak had seemingly replaced the formerly "positive" drugs with falsified substances. Her answer: more than eight years before her arrest. ", But another co-worker was suspicious, particularly since he "never saw Dookhan in front of a microscope.". They pulled her aside as she walked back to the courthouse from her car, where she had smoked "a fair amount of crack" during her lunch break. The hotline is open Monday through Friday, from 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. We were unable to subscribe you to WBUR Today. Her access to evidence was not restricted, and she continued testifying in court. Defense attorneys had. "It was almost like Dookhan wanted to get caught," one of her former co-workers told state police in 2012. This threw every sample she had ever tested into question. A hearing on their motions is scheduled next month. Although the year she wrote the notes wasnt listed on the worksheet, in the six years prior to her arrest, 2011 is the only year in which Dec. 22 fell on a Thursday. The chemist, Sonja Farak, worked at the state drug lab in Amherst, Massachusetts, for more than eight years. Kaczmarek wrote back. 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. GBH News brings you the stories, local voices, and big ideas that shape our world. They tend to be more freeform notes about the session and your impressions of the client's statements and demeanour. | This story is an effort to reconstruct what was known about Farak and Dookhan's crimes, and when, based on court filings, diaries, and interviews with the major players. How to Fix a Drug Scandal: behind a staggering Netflix crime docuseries Among the papers they seized were handwritten worksheets Farak completed for drug-abuse therapy. Before her sentencing, Farak failed a drug test while out on bail, according to Mass Live. Though. He was floored when he found the worksheets. "It would be difficult to overstate the significance of these documents," Ryan wrote to the attorney general's office. In the aftermath of Farak's arrest, it's been argued that because she was under the influence, all of the cases she tested could be considered to have been wrongfully convicted. Her ar-rest led to the dismissal of thousands of drug cases in Massachusetts. Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Accessibility at GBH, Transparency in Coverage Cost-Sharing Disclosures. "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.". He emailed them to Kaczmareksubject: "FARAK Admissions." 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 . They were all rendered unacceptable. Penate was convicted in December 2013 and sentenced to serve five to seven years. 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. But whether anyone investigated her conduct during a brief stint working at the state's Boston drug lab is at . "It is critical that all parties have unquestioned faith in that process from the beginning so that they will have full confidence in the conclusions drawn at the end," Coakley said. For people with disabilities needing assistance with the Public Files, contact Glenn Heath at 617-300-3268. At the time of Penates trial, the state Attorney Generals Office contended Faraks misdeeds dated back only as far as 2012. Farak's reports were central to thousands of cases, and the fact that she ran analyses while high and regularly dipped into "urge-ful" samples casts doubt on thousands of convictions. Initially, she had represented herself in answer to the complaints lodged against her, but later, she turned to Susan Sachs, who represented her since, not just on the Penate lawsuit, but also on any other case that emerged as the result of her actions in Amherst. She even made her own crack in the lab. A Powerful EHR to Manage a Thriving Practice. Her wrongdoings were exposed when unsealed cocaine and a crack pipe were found under her desk. There is nothing to indicate that the allegations against Farak date back to the time she tested the drugs in Penates case. Where Is Sonja Farak Now? If they'd kept digging, defendants might still have learned the crucial facts. email highlighted in the Velis-Merrigan report. Meier put the number at 40,323 defendants, though some have called that an overestimate. How to Fix a Drug Scandal (TV Mini Series 2020) - IMDb Lets find out. Sonja Farak | MA Drug Lab Scandals - GitHub Pages Her reporting focuses on mental health, criminal justice and education. The staff in the new lab was also doubled, and the number of trainees was also increased. Netflix released a new docu-series called "How to Fix a Drug Scandal." TherapyNotes Together, we can create a more connected and informed world. "No reasonable individual could have failed to appreciate the unlawfulness of [Kaczmarek's] actions in these circumstances," Robertson wrote in her ruling. ", The chemist, Sonja Farak, worked at the state drug lab in Amherst, Massachusetts, for more than eight years. Farak trabaj en el laboratorio Amherst desde el verano de 2004 y poco despus comenz a tomar las drogas del laboratorio. Sonja Farak now: what happened to the chemist featured in How to Fix a Foster Farak. When grand jury materials were eventually released to defense attorneys, then, they did not mention that these documents existed. She was sentenced to 18 months in jail plus five years of probation. Penate is seeking a new trial, contending the conviction should be reversed because of prosecutorial misconduct and evidence tainted by Farak. She had never quashed a subpoena before, but supervisors told her to fend off motions about Farak. Compromised drug samples often fit the definition. State officials rushed to condemn her loudly and publicly. The Dookhan prosecution was barely underway, a grand jury having returned indictments a few weeks earlier. "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. She said, It was about coping; it certainly wasnt about having fun; I dont think shes had fun in quite a while.. Without access to the diaries, the Springfield judge in 2013 found that Farak had starting stealing from samples in summer 2012. 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. 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. According to the Daily Hampshire Gazette, Farak graduated with awards and distinctions. "If she were suffering from back injurymaybe she took some oxys?" It included information about the type of drugs she tampered with. Sonja Farak. TherapyNotes. 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. 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. Chemist was high at work for 8 years: court docs - CBS News "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.". Per her own court testimony, as shown in the docu-series, Farak started working at a state drug lab in Amherst in 2004. Together, we can create a more connected and informed world. The actions of Sonja Farak and Annie Dookhan caused a racket of such a scale that the state had to recompense for it with millions of dollars and had to make a historic move in the dismissal of wrongful convictions. The civil lawsuit was one of the last tied to prosecutors' disputedhandling of the case against disgraced ex-chemist Sonja Farak, who was convicted in 2014 of ingesting drug samples she was supposed to test at the Amherst state drug lab. Massachusetts drug lab scandal tied to Sonja Farak and Hinton Lab In November 2013, Dookhan pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice, tampering with evidence, and perjury. Farak admitted to being on a list of drugs while working between 2004 and her 2013 arrest. From the April 2023 issue, Billy Binion Four months after Ryan found the worksheets, Judge Kinder Over time, Farak's drug use turned to cocaine, LSD and, eventually, crack. ", In 2004, her first full year at the lab, Dookhan reported analyzing approximately 700 samples per month. The attorney general's representative at these hearings was Assistant Attorney General Kris Foster, a recent hire. The lawsuit names Kaczmarek, Farak and three members of the state police. After serving just a year of her 18 month sentence, Farak was released from prison in 2015. Who is Sonja Farak, the former state drug lab chemist featured in the show? In an August 2013 email, Ryan asked Assistant Attorney General Kris Foster to review evidence taken from Farak. 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. Where is Sonja Farak Now? - The Cinemaholic Who is Sonja Farak? 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. It's Boston local news in one concise, fun and informative email. A. The criminal prosecution wasn't the only investigation of the Dookhan scandal. memo, Kaczmarek told her supervisors that "Farak's admissions on her 'emotional worksheets' recovered from her car detail her struggle with substance abuse. The four years since Ryan discovered Farak's diaries have been a bitter fight over this question of culpabilitywhether Kaczmarek, Foster, and their colleagues were merely careless or whether they deliberately hid crucial evidence. 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. On the surface, their crimes dont seem as injurious and they dont seem to enjoy inflicting pain on others. Where is Sonja Farak from How To Fix A Drug Scandal now? Kaczmarek was now juggling two scandals on opposite sides of the state. Joseph Ballou, lead investigator for the state police, called them the most important documents from the car. 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. 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. "Because on almost a daily basis Farak abused narcoticsthere is no assurance that she was able to perform chemical analysis correctly," the judge found. chemist, Sonja Farak, had been battling drug addiction and had tampered with samples she was assigned to test around the time she tested the samples in Penate's case. Its unclear if Farak is still with Lee, as they have both remained out of the public eye since the case. More than 24,000 convictions in 16,449 cases tainted by former state chemist Sonja Farak have been dismissed in a court case brought by the ACLU of Massachusetts, the Committee of Public Counsel Services (CPCS), and law firm Fick & Marx LLP. Prosecutors have an obligation to give the defense exculpatory evidence including anything that could weaken evidence against defendants. Tens of thousands of criminal drug cases were dismissed as a result of misconduct by Dookhan and Farak. According to the documents released Tuesday, investigators found that Sonja Farak tested drug samples and testified in court while under the influence of methamphetamines, ketamine, cocaine, LSD . answered that the state considered the evidence irrelevant to any case other than Faraks.. Soon after Dookhan's arrest, Coakley's office asked the governor to order a broader independent probe of the Hinton lab. 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. "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. During the next four years, she would periodically sober up and then relapse. They never searched Farak's computer or her home. A local prosecutor also asked Ballou to look into a case Farak had tested as far back as 2005. Foster protested that portions of the evidentiary file in question might be privileged or not subject to disclosure. Instead, she submitted an intentionally vague letter to the judge claiming defense attorneys already had everything. Farak had started taking drugs on the job within months of joining the lab. High Massachusetts Lab Chemist Causes Thousands Of Drug Cases To Be Dismissed. Coakley did not respond to multiple requests for comment for this story. Our posture is to not delve into the twists and turns of the investigation or the report and to let it stand on its own, Merrigan said. She's no longer in prison, as Farak has served her sentence. A status hearing on Penate's suit, which was filed in 2017, is scheduled for July. State prosecutors gave Farak the immunity they had declined to grant two years earlier, then asked when she started analyzing samples while high. The lead prosecutor on Farak's case knew about the diaries, as did supervisors at the state attorney general's office. The Farak scandal came as the state grappled with another drug lab crisis. A Compelling New Take on a Massachusetts Lab Scandal Tainting Thousands Democratic Gov. Sonja Farak, la qumica que tomaba drogas que registraba - Ahoramismo.com According to her teammates, She was the best center in the league last year, and they [felt] stronger with her in there than with some guys.. That settlement awaits approval by a judge. Between the two women, 47,000 drug convictions and guilty pleas have been dismissed in the last two years, many for misdemeanor possession. | At some point, the attorney general's office stopped chasing leads entirely. Here's Where Sonja Farak Is Now, After 'How to Fix a Drug Scandal' She grew up in Portsmouth with her sister Amy. 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. The drug lab technician was sent to prison for 18 months, but was released in 2015. She continued to experience suicidal thoughts, but instead of going through with those thoughts, she started taking the drugs that she would be testing at work. How to write better therapy progress notes: 10 examples Commonwealth v. Cotto | ACLU Massachusetts "The gravity of the present case cannot be overstated," Kaczmarek wrote in her memo recommending a prison sentence of five to seven years. Who Are Sonja Farak and Annie Dookhan? How to Fix a Drug Scandal True Story In the only quasi-independent probe of the Farak scandal ever ordered, Attorney General Healey and a district attorney appointed two retired judges to investigate in summer 2015. After serving for 13 months, she was released on parole in 2015. As federal food benefits decline, Mass. Magistrate Judge Robertson denied a request in Penate's lawsuit that Kaczmarek be prohibited from contesting the special hearing officer's findings. wrote she "tried to resist using @ work, but ended up failing." The fact that she ran analyses while high and regularly dipped into samples casts doubt on thousands of convictions. She was trying to suppress mental health issues, depression in specific, and she attempted to kill herself in high school, according to Rolling Stone. 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.". The charges against Penate were dismissed after Farak's conviction. The lone dissenting justice called the decision "too little and too late" and argued that the severity of the scandal required tossing all the cases. The Board of Bar Overseers (BBO) is reviewing the actions of three prosecutors in the investigation of the scandal to determine whether any of them deliberately withheld potentially exculpatory evidence. It took another three years for the truth to emerge. Judge dismisses 'qualified immunity' claim in suit against ex - WBUR In 2012, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court foundegregious prosecutorial misconduct after an assistant district attorney withheldevidence a judge had ordered him toproduce for the defense of a teenageraccused of statutory rape. As the state's top court put it, the criminal investigation into Farak was "cursory at best.". After high school, Sonja went on to major in biochemistry at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute in western Massachusetts. NORTHAMPTON Sonja J. Farak told a nurse at the Western Massachusetts Regional Women's Correctional Center in Chicopee in December 2013 that she used methamphetamines and other stimulants "whenever she could get her hands on them." And since her job as a chemist was to test drug samples at a state drug lab in Amherst, that opportunity came daily. 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. TherapyNotes is a complete practice management system with everything you need to manage patient records, schedule appointments, meet with patients remotely, create rich documentation, and bill insurance, right at your fingertips. Former State Chemist High At Work For Nearly 8 Years, Documents Say