Sonja Farak was a chemist working in the Amherest, Massachuetts drug lab. Her role was to receive drugs from cases and check if the chain of custody was correct and intact. Then, she would test the substance to determine what pure standard, or a substance at the highest purity levels. Afterward, she was expected to seal the evidence back and sign a certificate that stated she had done the tests and these were her results. Everything was looking clear for Sonja until it wasn’t. Sonja had been harboring a secret in a lab. She was taking methamphetamines to increase her “productivity” and had been replacing drugs she took from the lab with fake ones. Farak was caught when another chemist in the lab realized that samples were missing from the lab. When in pursuit of Farak, the authorities received a warrant to search her car, where they found illicit drugs. Farak was arrested for tampering with evidence in two different cases and being intoxicated while working.
Honestly, I was quite shocked to find out this information while watching How to Fix a Drug Scandal. It’s no shock that the justice system in America was corrupted, but to see that the corruption seeps so far into drug analysis. Chemists in reality hold high power when it comes to criminal cases because if they prove the substance is a drug it’s an open-and-shut case for that defendant. Farak malpractice caused a domino effect on the cases with their verdicts. The fallout from this case was that thousands of cases were now at risk of wrongful conviction since the drugs Farak tested were not retested. Also, authorities were trying to keep the case contained and didn’t want to cause more problems. The blame should be directed toward the lack of funding from the government that prevent the Amherst drug lab from meeting proper procedures and allowing Farak the opportunity to take the substances. (321)
I think the most unbelievable part of this story is that the cases in which Farak performed chemical analysis while “increasing her productivity” were not reinvestigated. There are very likely lots of convicts who did not get a fair trial because of the errors and misconduct carried out by Farak in performing her job as a forensic chemist. I believe those who might have been affected by Farak’s practices should be granted a retrial and repeated testing of the incriminating evidence samples from their respective cases.