sonja farak therapy notes

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. Powered by. Get all the latest from Sanditon on GBH Passport, How one Brookline studio helps artists with disabilities thrive. (Conveniently, they also found a Patriots schedule from 2011 in the car.). Subscribe to Reason Roundup, a wrap up of the last 24 hours of news, delivered fresh each morning. And both pose the obvious question about how chemists could behave so badly for years without detection. You have been subscribed to WBUR Today. The show also delves into the issues of the state in discovering and reporting on the extent of the cases that were affected by Faraks actions. They were all rendered unacceptable. 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 . She was also under the influence when she took the stand during her trial. A year later, in October 2014, prosecutors relented, granting access to the full evidence in Farak's case to attorney Luke Ryan. She was also testifying in court while high. Farak is amongst one of the 18 defendants battling the lawsuit filed by Rolando Penate. The judge ordered prosecutors and defense attorneys to coordinate on identifying undisclosed emails related to documents seized from the disgraced state crime lab chemist. Between Farak and Dookhanwho's also featured in How to Fix a Drug Scandal38,000 wrongfully convicted cases have been dismissed, according to the Washington Post. 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. The governor didn't appoint the inspector general or anyone else to determine how long Farak was altering samples or running analyses while high. Shawn Musgrave is a reporter who was until recently based in Boston. "I would have done it": Filmmaker on indentifying with the "How to Fix Tens of thousands of criminal drug cases were dismissed as a result of misconduct by Dookhan and Farak. Who is Sonja Farak, the former state drug lab chemist featured in the show? In her June 17 ruling, U.S. Magistrate Judge Katherine Robertson dismissed former Assistant Attorney General Anne Kaczmarek's claims of qualified immunity a doctrine that gives legal immunity to some public officials accused of misconduct. Damning evidence reveals drug lab chemist Sonja Farak's addictions. You can check your records electronically by following this link: https://icori.chs.state.ma.us. As . Hearing Officer Finds Misconduct Against Former Drug Lab Prosecutors - WBUR It was an astoundingly light touch for the second state chemist arrested in six months. The former judges and the state police officers who helped them conducted a thorough review, said Emalie Gainey, spokeswoman for Attorney General Maura Healey. The surveillance of the chemists as well as the standards and the confiscated drugs has also been increased considerably. This is merely a fishing expedition, Foster wrote in The report The Attorney Generals Office, Velis and Merrigan and the state police declined to answer questions about the handling of the Farak evidence. In worksheet notes dated Thursday, Dec. 22, Farak 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. 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. Rollins said it covers "a period of time in which either now disgraced chemist Annie Dookhan, or another convicted chemist Sonja Farak ," worked there. Who Is Sonja Farak From Netflix Docu-Series How To Fix A Drug Scandal 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. 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. Together, we can create a more connected and informed world. Obviously, after a blunder of such scale, no one would want their samples checked from the same lab. 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. With the Dookhan case so fresh, reporters immediately labeled Farak "the second chemist. The criminal prosecution wasn't the only investigation of the Dookhan scandal. Farak was getting high off the confiscated drugs police sent her way before replacing the evidence with fake drugs. Among the papers they seized were handwritten worksheets Farak completed for drug-abuse therapy. 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. According to the Daily Hampshire Gazette, Farak graduated with awards and distinctions. "It was almost like Dookhan wanted to get caught," one of her former co-workers told state police in 2012. 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.. As Kaczmarek herself later observed, Farak essentially had "a drugstore at her disposal" from her first day at the Amherst lab. Local prosecutors also remained in the dark. Reporting for this story was supported by the Fund for Investigative Journalism. Due to the conviction, prosecutors were forced to dismiss more than . Before her sentencing, Farak failed a drug test while out on bail, according to Mass Live. Sonja Farak was a chemist at a state drug lab in Amherst, Massachusetts, from 2005 to 2013. ", Prosecutors maintained that Faraks rogue behavior spanned just a few months. memo, Kaczmarek told her supervisors that "Farak's admissions on her 'emotional worksheets' recovered from her car detail her struggle with substance abuse. Her medical records included notes from Faraks therapist in Amherst, Anna Kogan. The lax security and regulations of the place and the negligent supervision of the employees and the stock of standards are the reasons why Farak was encouraged to do what she did. Two Massachusetts drug lab technicians Sonja Farak and Annie Dookhan were caught tainting evidence in separate drug labs in different but equally shocking ways. Each employee had a unique swipe card, but Farak simply used a physical key to get in after hours and on weekends. Gainey added that Healey is pleased with their conclusion that prosecutors and the state police acted appropriately. It's been like this forever, or at least since girlhood. Sonja Farak: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know | Heavy.com Sonja Farak had admitted to stealing and using drugs from the drug lab where she worked as a chemist for around 9 years. Foster and another assistant attorney general assented to that motion. Both scandals undercut confidence in the criminal justice system and the validity of forensic analysis. This very well could have been the end of the investigative trail but for a few stubborn defense lawyers, who appealed the ruling. Foster consulted Kaczmarek about the files contents, according to an In 2012, she began taking from co-workers' samples, forging intake forms and editing the lab database to cover her tracks. At the time of Penates trial, the state Attorney Generals Office contended Faraks misdeeds dated back only as far as 2012. 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. El 6 de enero de 2014, Farak se declar culpable de los cargos en su contra. 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. Perhaps, as criminal justice scandals inevitably emerge, we need to get more independent eyes on the evidence from the start. 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. Inwardly though, Sonja Farak was striving. Dookhan was now spending less time at her lab bench and more time testifying in court about her results. 2023 Cinemaholic Inc. All rights reserved. He also 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. 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. 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. 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. 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 . From 2004 to 2013, Farak took advantage of . The cocaine, found in an unsealed, completed drug-testing kit, tested negativemeaning Farak had seemingly replaced the formerly "positive" drugs with falsified substances. 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? Ryan finally viewed the file in the attorney generals offices in October 2014. How to Fix a Drug Scandal: With Shannon O'Neill, Karl Kenzler, Paul Solotaroff, Scott Allen. MA: A reckoning for prosecutors in drug lab scandal? - NADDI In 2019, she was seen leaving the Springfield Federal Court but declined to comment on the status of the case. . After weeks of hearings, a "special hearing officer" selected by the board recommended potential sanctions against them all. 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. The justices ordered Healey's department to cover all costs of notifying all defendants whose cases were dismissed. denied Penates motion to dismiss the case, saying there was no evidence that Faraks misconduct extended to his case. 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. ", But another co-worker was suspicious, particularly since he "never saw Dookhan in front of a microscope.". Shawn Musgrave Instead, Kaczmarek proceeded as if the substance abuse was a recent development. At the time of her arrest, she had resided in 37 Laurel Park in Northampton. As the state's top court put it, the criminal investigation into Farak was "cursory at best.". Sonja Farak pleaded guilty to stealing samples of drugs from an Amherst drug lab. Farak apparently still tested each caseunlike Annie Dookhan, another Massachusetts chemist who was arrested five months prior to Farak for fabricating test results. Kaczmarek had obtained the evidence at issue while she was prosecuting Farak on state charges of tampering with evidence and drug possession. The court also dismissed all meth cases processed at the lab since Farak started in 2004. NORTHAMPTON Sonja J. Farak told a nurse at the Western Massachusetts 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. Investigators either missed or declined opportunities to dig very deep. Dookhan was sentenced to prison in 2013. ", Prosecutors nationwide pretty uniformly backed this argument, which the Supreme Court rejected in a 54 opinion. Investigators gave that information to Kaczmarek and the state AG's office,according tohearings before thestate board that disciplines attorneys. Farak started at Amherst lab in Aug 2004 p. 32. Support GBH. TherapyNotes If they'd kept digging, defendants might still have learned the crucial facts. 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. 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. 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. In a rare move, the judicial office that brings disciplinary cases against lawyers in Massachusetts has accused a prosecutor of professional misconduct, including allegations that she failed to share critical information with defense lawyers and attempted to interfere with defense witnesses. A Powerful EHR to Manage a Thriving Practice. As federal food benefits decline, Mass. 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. memo to Judge Kinder the next week, Foster said she reviewed the file, and said every document in it had already been disclosed. A Compelling New Take on a Massachusetts Lab Scandal Tainting Thousands 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. Many more are likely to follow, with the total expected to exceed 50,000. 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. Accessibility | Foster said that Kaczmarek told her all relevant evidence had been turned over and that her supervisor told her to write the letter, though both denied these claims. Kaczmarek quoted the worksheets in a memo to her supervisor, Verner, and others, summarizing that they revealed Farak's "struggle with substance abuse." The last contact information provided by her, in response to Penates allegations, placed her residence in Hatfield, Massachusetts. This not only led to people getting a reprieve from prison but also filing their own lawsuits against the injustice they had to suffer. How To Write Therapy Progress Notes: 8 Templates & Examples - Quenza Farak. compelled release of additional drug treatment records, which indicated Farak used a variety of drugs that she stole from the lab for years. 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. Introduction. 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. 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. Kaczmarek got a note from Sgt. She was ar-rested for tampering with evidence while abusing narcotics at work. That motion was denied, and the notice letters will explain Farak's tampering without any mention of prosecutorial misconduct. Only a few months after Dookhan's conviction, it was discovered that another Massachusetts crime lab worker, Sonja Farak, who was addicted to drugs, not only stole her supply from the. sonja farak - masslive.com ", Officials rushed to downplay the situation in Amherst. "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.". Though. Officials recognized the worksheets for what they were: near-indisputable confessions. Having barely investigated her, prosecutors indicted Farak only for the samples in her possession the day she was caught. 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. She had been accused of intentional infliction of emotional distress in addition to the conspiracy to violate [Penates] civil rights.. Shortly into her role at Amherst, Farak decided to try liquid methamphetamine to ease her personal struggles. They never searched Farak's computer or her home. Netflix released a new docu-series called "How to Fix a Drug Scandal." 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. She started seeing a substance abuse therapist around this time. Her wrongdoings were exposed when unsealed cocaine and a crack pipe were found under her desk. A drug chemist . 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. | Sonja Farak, la qumica que tomaba drogas que registraba - Ahoramismo.com What Happened To Sonja From Netflix Drug Scandal Series - Refinery29 Because state prosecutors hid Farak's substance abuse diaries, it took far too long for the full timeline of her crimes to become public. "First, of course, are the defendants, who when charged in the criminal justice system have the right to expect that they will be given due process and there will be fair and accurate information used in any prosecution against them." Because of all that, it's no surprise that Farak was sent to prison in Massachusetts. There were also newspaper articles about other officials caught stealing drugs, including one with a scribbled note, "Thank god I'm not a law enforcement officer." As Solotaroff recounts in detail, Massachusetts attorney Luke Ryan represented two people who were accused of drug charges that Farak had analyzed . In December 2011, after police in Springfield, Mass., had arrested Renaldo Penate for allegedly selling heroin, the drugs from that case were tested at a state drug lab by technician Sonja Farak. If Farak found a substance was a true drug, the person it was confiscated from could be convicted of a substance-related crime. Between the two women, 47,000 drug convictions and guilty pleas have been dismissed in the last two years, many for misdemeanor possession. 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 state's top court took an even harsher view, ruling in October 2018 that the attorney general's office as an institution was responsible for the prosecutorial misconduct of its former employees. Ryan then filed a 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. And yet, due to their actions, they did injure people and they did inflict a lot of pain, not just on a couple of people, but on thousands. Since then, she has kept a low profile. This might not have mattered as much if the investigators had followed the evidence that Farak had been using drugs for at least a year and almost certainly longer. How to Fix a Drug Scandal is an American true crime documentary miniseries that was released on Netflix on April 1, 2020. As he leafed through three boxes of evidence, he found the substance abuse worksheets and diaries. With your support, GBH will continue to innovate, inspire and connect through reporting you value that meets todays moments. This immediately provoked questions about the thousands of cases in which her findings had contributed to the imprisonment of an individual. And when the tests she did run came back negative, Dookhan added controlled substances to the vials. The scandal led. 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. She was sentenced to 18 months in jail plus five years of probation. Where Are How to Fix a Drug Scandal's Sonja Farak and Kris - Decider As How to Fix a Drug Scandal explores, Farak had long struggled with her mental . 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. His report deemed Dookhan the "sole bad actor" at the lab, a finding that remains disputed in some circles. It included information about the type of drugs she tampered with. Given the account that Farak was a law-abiding citizen, it is questioned as to how an 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. In November 2013, Dookhan pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice, tampering with evidence, and perjury. They were found with their packaging sliced open and their contents apparently altered. In June 2017, following hearings in which Kaczmarek, Foster, Verner, and others took the stand, a judge found that Kaczmarek and Foster together "piled misrepresentation upon misrepresentation to shield the mental health worksheets from disclosure.". It declined Farak's offer of a detailed confession in exchange for leniency, nixing the offer without even negotiating terms. Commonwealth v. Cotto | ACLU Massachusetts 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. She said, It was about coping; it certainly wasnt about having fun; I dont think shes had fun in quite a while.. 3.3.2023 4:50 PM, 2022 Reason Foundation | It's not as bad as Dookhan, they asserted and implied over and over. Meier put the number at 40,323 defendants, though some have called that an overestimate. May 2003 started working in Hinton drug lab p. 14. 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. From the April 2023 issue, Billy Binion 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. The information showed that Farak sought therapy for drug addiction and that her misconduct had been ongoing for years. Sonja Farak: Defendant Rafael Rodriguez died of drug overdose - MEAWW Maybe it's not a matter of checklists or reminders that prosecutors have to keep their eyes open for improprieties. 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. To better estimate how many convictions will have to be reviewed because of Farak, the Supreme Judicial Court 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.". 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. After her arrest, she received support from her parents, who showed up to her court appearances, the Daily Hampshire Gazette reported. One was clearly dated November 16, 2011a year and two months before her arrest. Terms Of Use, (Annie Dookhan (left) and Sonja Farak, Associated Press). The disgraced chemist was sentenced to less than two years behind bars in 2014, following her guilty pleas for stealing cocaine from the lab. Still, the state was acquiring evidence. A scandal erupts, raising questions for the thousands of defendants in her cases. YouTube 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. Drug lab cases information | Mass.gov Sonja Farak in How to Fix a Drug Scandal. The medical records stated that she did not have an existing drug problem that was amplified by her access to more substances. She is not active on any social media platform and has kept her distance from the press. 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. In a 61 ruling by the Supreme Judicial Court in 2017, the defense bar, led by public defenders and the Massachusetts branch of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), won the dismissal of almost every conviction based on Dookhan's analysismore than 36,000 cases in all. Massachusetts drug lab scandal tied to Sonja Farak and Hinton Lab | In an August 2013 email, Ryan asked Assistant Attorney General Kris Foster to review evidence taken from Farak. 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. PDF Applying Routine Activity Theory: A Case Study of the Sonya Farak Drug Farak was released from prison in 2015 and has kept a low profile since. email highlighted in the Velis-Merrigan report. A status hearing on Penate's suit, which was filed in 2017, is scheduled for July. The defense bar had raised concerns that prosecutors might be "perceived as having a stake" in such an investigation. She started smoking crack cocaine in 2011 and was soon using it 10 to 12 times a day. 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. Farak admitted in testimony that she began using drugs almost as soon as she started working at the Massachusetts State Crime Lab in Amherst.

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