Listen Live: Classic and Contemporary Celtic, Listen Live: Cape, Coast and Islands NPR Station, Boston nonprofit Street2Ivy is producing this generation's entrepreneurs. She was sentenced in 2014 to 18 months in prison and 5 years of probation. Joseph . 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 - masslive.com It included information about the type of drugs she tampered with. Subscribe to Reason Roundup, a wrap up of the last 24 hours of news, delivered fresh each morning. Because state prosecutors hid Farak's substance abuse diaries, it took far too long for the full timeline of her crimes to become public. "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.". 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 place was closed as soon as Faraks crimes came to light. 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. How to Fix a Drug Scandal: behind a staggering Netflix crime docuseries Sonja Farak, a chemist with a longterm mental health struggle, is the catalyst of the story, but it doesn't end with her. According to a newspaper article from 1992, she was the first female in Rhode Island to be on a high school football team. Judge Kinder denied Ryans motion. Robertson rejected Kaczmarek's claims she should not be held responsible for the turning over of exculpatory evidence because she was not part of the "prosecution team" in Penate's case. 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. As . Penate is seeking a new trial, contending the conviction should be reversed because of prosecutorial misconduct and evidence tainted by Farak. After serving just a year of her 18 month sentence, Farak was released from prison in 2015. "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. Meier put the number at 40,323 defendants, though some have called that an overestimate. 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." 3.4.2023 8:00 AM, Reason Staff How to Fix a Drug Scandal - Wikipedia She was released in 2015, as reported by Mass Live. After serving for 13 months, she was released on parole in 2015. "Forensic evidence is not uniquely immune from the risk of manipulation," Justice Antonin Scalia wrote for the majority. State prosecutors hadnt provided this evidence to other district attorneys offices contending with the Farak fallout, either. Compromised drug samples often fit the definition. What Did Sonja Farak Do, Exactly? Farak was released from prison in 2015 and has kept a low profile since. Disgraced drug lab chemist Sonja Farak emerges as her own attorney as defendant in $5.7 million federal lawsuit. "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. If chemists had to testify in person, Coakley warned melodramatically, misdemeanor drug prosecutions "would essentially grind to a halt. 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. noted the mental health worksheets found in Faraks car, which had not been released. One thing that How to Fix a Drug Scandal makes clear is that it wasnt all Sonja Faraks fault. Farak worked under the influence of drugs for nine years - from 2004 to 2013 - before she was caught. The disgraced chemist was sentenced to less than two years behind bars in 2014, following her guilty pleas for stealing cocaine from the lab. Sonja Farak, a chemist with a longterm mental health struggle, is the catalyst of the story, but it doesn't end with her. 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. 3.3.2023 5:45 PM, Jacob Sullum As How to Fix a Drug Scandal explores, Farak had long struggled with her mental . Lets find out. Though. 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. Terms Of Use, (Annie Dookhan (left) and Sonja Farak, Associated Press). Perhaps, as criminal justice scandals inevitably emerge, we need to get more independent eyes on the evidence from the start. 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. "It would be difficult to overstate the significance of these documents, Ryan Four months after Ryan found the worksheets, Judge Kinder She was arrested in 2013 when the supervisor at the Amherst lab was made aware that two samples were missing. The governor also tapped a local attorney, David Meier, to count how many individuals' cases might be tainted. But a crucial issue was not before the court. Stream GBH's Award-Winning Content For Parents And Children. 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. One of the reasons for the decrepit state and standard of the Amherst lab was the lack of funds. You can check your records electronically by following this link: https://icori.chs.state.ma.us. Where Is Sonja Farak From Netflix's 'Drug Scandal' Doc Now? Sonja Farak. Because she did so, Plaintiff served more than five years in a state prison.". February 2013 email, to which he attached the worksheets. The drug lab technician was sent to prison for 18 months, but was released in 2015. It was an astoundingly light touch for the second state chemist arrested in six months. 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. Netflix released a new docu-series called "How to Fix a Drug Scandal." Read More: Where is Sonja Farak Sister Now? Or she just lied about her results altogether: In one of the more ludicrous cases, she testified under oath that a chunk of cashew was crack cocaine. YouTube The former judges and the state police officers who helped them conducted a thorough review, said Emalie Gainey, spokeswoman for Attorney General Maura Healey. concluded there was no evidence of prosecutorial misconduct or obstruction of justice in matters related to the Farak case. How to Fix a Drug Scandal is an American true crime documentary miniseries that was released on Netflix on April 1, 2020. She was also testifying in court while high. Her job consisted of testing drugs that have. 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.". In 2017, a different judge ruled that Foster's actions constituted a "fraud upon the court," calling the letter "deliberately misleading." But unlike with Dookhan, no one launched a bigger investigation of Farak. Farak is amongst one of the 18 defendants battling the lawsuit filed by Rolando Penate. 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. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled in 2015by which time the current state attorney general, Maura Healey, had been electedthat it was "imperative" for the government to "thoroughly investigate the timing and scope of Farak's misconduct." ", Officials rushed to downplay the situation in Amherst. 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. With your support, GBH will continue to innovate, inspire and connect through reporting you value that meets todays moments. compelled release of additional drug treatment records, which indicated Farak used a variety of drugs that she stole from the lab for years. TherapyNotes. There is nothing to indicate that the allegations against Farak date back to the time she tested the drugs in Penates case. The lead prosecutor on Farak's case knew about the diaries, as did supervisors at the state attorney general's office. 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. Who Are Sonja Farak and Annie Dookhan? How to Fix a Drug Scandal True Story Who is Sonja Farak? 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. That settlement awaits approval by a judge. State prosecutors gave Farak the immunity they had declined to grant two years earlier, then asked when she started analyzing samples while high. Please note that if your case has been identified for dismissal, it could take approximately 2-3 months for the relevant court records to be updated. 1. 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. Penate alleged Kaczmarek's actions violated his "Brady rights," which require prosecutors to turn over potentially exculpatory evidence to defense counsel. And when the tests she did run came back negative, Dookhan added controlled substances to the vials. Two weeks after Ryans discovery, the Attorney Generals Office Coakley's office finally launched a criminal investigation in July 2012, more than a year after the infraction was discovered by Dookhan's supervisors. It's been like this forever, or at least since girlhood. 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. After high school, Sonja went on to major in biochemistry at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute in western Massachusetts. 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. 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 . Massachusetts Chemist Prosecution Leads to Falling Consumer Confidence In the series, it's explained that Farak loved the energy the meth gave her. denied Penates motion to dismiss the case, saying there was no evidence that Faraks misconduct extended to his case. Foster replied that because the investigation against Farak was ongoing, she couldnt let him see it. Farak wasn't the first Massachusetts chemist to tamper with drug evidence. Accessibility | The cocaine, found in an unsealed, completed drug-testing kit, tested negativemeaning Farak had seemingly replaced the formerly "positive" drugs with falsified substances. A Powerful EHR to Manage a Thriving Practice. The Attorney Generals Office, Velis and Merrigan and the state police declined to answer questions about the handling of the Farak evidence. In January 2014, she pleaded guilty to evidence tampering and drug possession. Did Falsified Drug Tests Lead to Wrongful Convictions? - Rolling Stone She grew up in Portsmouth with her sister Amy. Because of all that, it's no surprise that Farak was sent to prison in Massachusetts. Powered by WordPress.com VIP. Kaczmarek has repeatedly testified she did not act intentionally and that she thought the worksheets had been turned over to the district attorneys who prosecuted the cases involved. This very well could have been the end of the investigative trail but for a few stubborn defense lawyers, who appealed the ruling. The defense bar also demanded answers on how such crucial evidence stayed buried for so long. "That was one of the lines I had thought I would never cross: I wouldn't tamper with evidence, I wouldn't smoke crack, and then I wouldn't touch other people's work," Farak said. The justices ordered Healey's department to cover all costs of notifying all defendants whose cases were dismissed. Her medical records included notes from Faraks therapist in Amherst, Anna Kogan. Massachusetts DA seeks to vacate thousands of drug convictions - CNN 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. A few months before her arrest, Farak's counselor recommended in-patient rehab. motion on behalf of another client to see the evidence. "As the gatekeeper to this evidence, she failed to turn over documents, and she adamantly opposed the requests for access. ", Prosecutors nationwide pretty uniformly backed this argument, which the Supreme Court rejected in a 54 opinion. Sonja Farak in How to Fix a Drug Scandal. In court, she added that there was "no smoking gun" in the evidence. The charges against Penate were dismissed after Farak's conviction. Farak had started taking drugs on the job within months of joining the lab. The Hinton drug lab, operated by the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, appears to have been run largely on the honor system. May 2003 started working in Hinton drug lab p. 14. 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. After she was caught, Farak pleaded guilty to stealing drugs from the lab and was sentenced to prison time of 18 months. Sonja Farak, la qumica que tomaba drogas que registraba - Ahoramismo.com Massachusetts drug lab scandal tied to Sonja Farak and Hinton Lab Sonja Farak was a chemist for a state crime lab in Massachusetts. That motion was denied, and the notice letters will explain Farak's tampering without any mention of prosecutorial misconduct. Sonja Farak Cracked Out - Rough Diplomacy 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. 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. "It was almost like Dookhan wanted to get caught," one of her former co-workers told state police in 2012. And yet, despite explicit requests for this kind of evidence, 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. 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. 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. 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. Farak as a young. "It would be difficult to overstate the significance of these documents," Ryan wrote to the attorney general's office. A judge sentenced Dookhan to three years in prison; she was granted parole in April 2016. In November 2013, Dookhan pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice, tampering with evidence, and perjury. But without access to evidence showing how long Farak had been doing this, defendants with constitutional grounds for challenging their incarceration were held for months and even years longer than necessary. Inwardly though, Sonja Farak was striving. She even made her own crack in the lab. Such strong claims were too hasty at best, since investigators had not yet finished basic searches; three days later, police executed a warrant for a duffel bag they found stuffed behind Farak's desk. They were all rendered unacceptable. High Massachusetts Lab Chemist Causes Thousands Of Drug Cases To Be Dismissed. He was floored when he found the worksheets. The lawsuit names Kaczmarek, Farak and three members of the state police. 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 . He didn't buy her quibbling that there's a difference between an explicit lie and obfuscation by grammar. Who is Sonja Farak, the former state drug lab chemist featured in the show? 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 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 . 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. How to Fix a Drug Scandal: With Shannon O'Neill, Karl Kenzler, Paul Solotaroff, Scott Allen. Grand Jury Transcript - Sonja Farak - September 16, 2015 Contributed by Shawn Musgrave (Musgrave Investigations) p. 1. 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 drug chemist . 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. Her reporting focuses on mental health, criminal justice and education. Privacy Policy | Sgt. But Ryan, who represented Penate, suspected it was more extensive. Obviously, after a blunder of such scale, no one would want their samples checked from the same lab. Sonja Farak exposed - full extent of her drug use and where she is now The new numbers appear in a report issued by a court-designated "Special Master." Release year: 2020. Heres what you need to know about Sonja Farak: Farak was born on January 13, 1978, in Rhode Island to Stanley and Linda Farak. Nassif put Dookhan on desk duty but allowed her to finish testing cases already on her plate, including some of the samples she had taken from the locker. 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. Democratic Gov. Many more are likely to follow, with the total expected to exceed 50,000. Name. Joseph Ballou, lead investigator for the state police, called them the most important documents from the car. Kaczmarek argued before the BBO, and in response to Penate's lawsuit, that she was focused on prosecuting Farak and not defendants, like Penate, whose criminal cases were affected by Farak's misconduct. With the Dookhan case so fresh, reporters immediately labeled Farak "the second chemist. At least 11,000 cases have already been dismissed due to fallout from the scandal, with thousands more likely to come. Sonja Farak: Prosecutors kept drug abuse evidence secret so - MEAWW And so, when she pleaded guilty in January 2014, Farak got what one attorney called "de facto immunity." "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.". 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. Kaczmarek wrote back. She soon crossed all these lines. "The mental health worksheets constituted admissions by the state lab chemist assigned to analyze the samples seized in Plaintiffs case that she was stealing and using lab samples to feed a drug addiction at the time she was testing and certifying the samples in Plaintiffs case, including, in one instance, on the very day that she certified a sample," Robertson's ruling reads. As a teenager, she had attempted suicide. Tens of thousands of criminal drug cases were dismissed as a result of misconduct by Dookhan and Farak. The chemist, Sonja Farak, worked at the state drug lab in Amherst, Massachusetts, for more than eight years. ", In 2004, her first full year at the lab, Dookhan reported analyzing approximately 700 samples per month. 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. Maybe it's not a matter of checklists or reminders that prosecutors have to keep their eyes open for improprieties. The chemist, Sonja Farak, worked at the Amherst crime . Who Is Sonja Farak From Netflix's 'How to Fix a Drug Scandal'? | True In the aftermath, the court felt it necessary to make clear that "no prosecutorhas the authority to decline to disclose exculpatory information.". The number is 888-999-2881. Introduction. Each employee had a unique swipe card, but Farak simply used a physical key to get in after hours and on weekends. Patrick said "the most important take-home" was that "no individual's due process rights were compromised.". Coakley assigned the case against Dookhan to Assistant Attorney General Anne Kaczmarek and her supervisor, John Verner. 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." Out of "an abundance of caution," Kaczmarek didn't present them to the grand jury that was convened to determine whether to indict Farak. mentioned a New England Patriots game on Saturday, Dec. 24 which corresponded with a game date in 2011. 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. Kaczmarek was now juggling two scandals on opposite sides of the state. 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.". Judge Kinder ordered her to produce all potentially privileged documents for his review to determine whether they could be disclosed. "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.". . She couldn't be sure which cases these were, Dookhan told investigators. 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. High Mass. Lab Chemist Causes Over 24,000 Drug Charges To Be Dismissed He emailed them to Kaczmareksubject: "FARAK Admissions." Drug lab cases information | Mass.gov Two Massachusetts drug lab technicians Sonja Farak and Annie Dookhan were caught tainting evidence in separate drug labs in different but equally shocking ways. 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. The newest true crime series from Netflix, How to Fix a Drug Scandal, was released on April 1, 2020. His report deemed Dookhan the "sole bad actor" at the lab, a finding that remains disputed in some circles. They were found with their packaging sliced open and their contents apparently altered. The story of the intertwining Farak and Penate evidence began in January 2013, when state police arrested Farak and searched her car. food banks expect a surge, As streaming services boom, cable TV continues its decline. 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.. But whether anyone investigated her conduct during a brief stint working at the state's Boston drug lab is at . Investigators found that Sonja Farak tested drug samples and testified in court while under the influence of methamphetamines, ketamine, cocaine, LSD and other drugs between 2005 and 2013. This not only led to people getting a reprieve from prison but also filing their own lawsuits against the injustice they had to suffer. Farak had started taking drugs on the job within months of joining the Amherst lab in 2004. B. ut when Penates lawyer tried to obtain the documents not certain what was in them before his clients 2013 trial, he was rebuffed by state prosecutors who said the papers were irrelevant according to emails included in investigative reports unsealed earlier this month. Netflix's How to Fix a Drug Scandal: What Happened To Sonja Farak