Government Chemist Tampered With 40,000 Cases, Locking Countless Innocent Americans in Prison
In a maddening scandal that
is rocking the state of Massachusetts, a government crime lab chemist
has been caught intentionally forging signatures and tampering with
evidence in as many as 40,000 cases, destroying the lives of countless innocent Americans.
Annie Dookhan worked as a chemist for the State of Massachusetts, and it turns out she had close relations with prosecutors.
These prosecutors were able to successfully convict innocent
Americans because Dookhan would chemically taint the “evidence,”
resulting in career boosts for the prosecutors while innocent men and
women were torn from their families and locked in cells.
Prosecutors praised Dookhan’s work and depended on her to get the convictions they wanted.
Hundreds of “convicts” and defendents have already been released, and
there are potentially thousands more waiting to be set free.
Norfolk
County District Attorney Michael Morrissey is reviewing thousands of
files to determine which cases must be thrown out or retried because of
potentially tainted evidence. | Source: Tovia Smith/NPR
Dookhan used her position to forge results for nearly a decade. ”I
don’t think anyone ever perceived that one person was capable of causing
this much chaos,”
says Norfolk County District Attorney Michael Morrissey.
“You can see the entire walls full of boxes… in
one of these cardboard boxes, there could be hundreds of cases … in each box,” says Morrissey.
Hundreds of defendants and “convicts” had been arguing that they were
framed and claiming that the evidence used to convict them was
mishandled. They were right.
In one recent case, a man was charged with “selling cocaine and
heroin.” His public defender, Julieann Hernon, believes that this man
was a potential victim of Dookhan’s fake evidence and ought to be
released.
“[Dookhan] was mis-testing evidence, dry-labbing evidence, saying she
had ‘conducted tests’ when she had not, deliberately tainting drugs,”
Hernon said.
“Certainly, I think, we have to presume a taint here when Annie Dookhan was the chemist in the case,” Hernon says.
In another recent case, defense attorney William Sullivan was able to
successfully reverse his client’s prior “guilt” because Dookhan was the
secondary chemist involved in the conviction.
Many other innocents have lost their careers, lost their children, and lost their marriages.
“This is a lab that was pretty much wholly and fully contaminated by Ms. Annie Dookhan,”
Sullivan told the judge. “She had full access to everyone’s drugs.”
While many have been set free, they will never get the lost years of their lives back.
“The tragedy is that my client already did four years on this,” Sullivan says. “I mean, that is disturbing in itself.”
Many other innocents have lost their careers, lost their children, and lost their marriages.
Michael Morrissey, Norfolk County District Attorney, is now sifting
through thousands of files to find out which should be thrown out
because of Dookhan’s corruption and deceit.
In federal court, many innocents received even harsher sentences due
to prior convictions based on Annie Dookhan’s fake “evidence.”
Several civil suits are getting started by those accused of crimes
based on Dookhan’s tampering, accusing Dookhan of trampling on their
rights to fair trials.
“I screwed up big time. I messed up. I messed up bad. It’s my fault. I
don’t want the lab to get in trouble,” Dookhan was reported as saying.
Of course, Dookhan’s “screw up” — a “screw up” that she intentionally
committed for nearly a decade — will never bring back the lives that
have been destroyed.
In analyzing Dookhan’s career, it was found that she also routinely
invented fanciful job titles for herself. Examples include “special
agent of operations” and “on-call terrorism supervisor.” She would
testify in court as an “expert.”
She maintained her composure year after year as innocents were bound and forced into prison cages.
The relationships she had with prosecutors are also under scrutiny.
Dookhan once told a prosecutor in an email that she couldn’t use her
expert testimony at a trial. The prosecutor replied, “No no no!!! I need
you!!!”
Was the prosecutor intentionally depending on Dookhan’s deception to score a conviction and a career boost?
Many of the prosecutors became devoted fans of Dookhan and wanted to
take her out for drinks, saying she was on their “dream team.” The
Boston Globe provided an email between Dookhan and a prosecutor with whom she had a particularly friendly relationship:
“Glad we are on the same team,” he once
wrote Dookhan — including one day in May 2010 when he told her he needed
a marijuana sample to weigh at least 50 pounds so that he could charge
the owners with drug trafficking.
“Any help would be greatly appreciated!” he wrote, punctuating each sentence with a long string of exclamation points. “Thank you!”
Two hours later, Dookhan responded: “OK . . . definitely Trafficking, over 80 lbs.” Papachristos thanked her profusely.
Boston attorney David Meier found that in Dookhan’s nine-year government position,
over 40,ooo people may have had their cases tainted by Dookhan.
But the devastation done to families is impossible to calculate.
Dookhan is now facing charges of her own. If she is convicted she
will receive a relatively light sentence of three to five years, which
has outraged citizens even more.
