Bulletin: Sonja Farak: Rolando Penate: Massachusetts; Dynamite exposée by "The Eye"..."Defense attorneys say withheld Farak notes implicate prosecutors," by Shawn Musgrave..."Massachusetts prosecutors withheld evidence of corrupt state narcotics testing for months from a defendant facing drug charges, and didn’t release it until after his conviction, according to newly surfaced documents and emails. The case of Rolando Penate has become a leading example for lawyers calling for further investigation into alleged misconduct by prosecutors who handled documents seized from Sonja Farak, the Amherst crime-lab chemist convicted of stealing and tampering with drug samples. Penate is seeking a new trial, contending the conviction should be reversed because of prosecutorial misconduct and evidence tainted by Farak. His is one of what lawyers say could be thousands of convictions questioned in the wake of the Farak scandal. The Farak documents indicate she used drugs on the very day she certified samples as heroin in Penate’s case. But when Penate’s lawyer tried to obtain the documents — not certain what was in them — before his client’s 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. At the time of Penate’s trial, the state Attorney General’s Office contended Farak’s misdeeds dated back only as far as 2012."..."Prosecutors have an obligation to give the defense exculpatory evidence – including anything that could weaken evidence against defendants. Compromised drug samples often fit the definition."... Defense attorney Luke Ryan describes finding undisclosed evidence that was seized from Sonja Farak’s car, as well as how he determined that the documents were from 2011. “It would be difficult to overstate the significance of these documents,” Ryan wrote to the Attorney General’s Office two days later. State prosecutors hadn’t provided this evidence to other district attorneys’ offices contending with the Farak fallout, either. Two weeks after Ryan’s discovery, the Attorney General’s Office shipped nearly 300 pages of previously undisclosed materials to local prosecutors around the state. “Not only did they not turn these documents over, but I wasn’t aware that they existed,” said Frank Flannery, who was the Hampden County assistant district attorney assigned to appeals following Farak’s arrest. “At the very least, we expected that we would get everything they collected in their case against Farak.” Flannery, now in private practice, said the substance abuse worksheets are “clearly relevant” to defendants challenging Farak’s analysis. Four months after Ryan found the worksheets, Judge Kinder compelled release of additional drug treatment records, which indicated Farak used a variety of drugs that she stole from the lab for years. Penate and other defendants are asking see all of Foster’s emails regarding Farak and other materials relating to the handling of evidence in the chemist's case. A hearing on their motions is scheduled next month."

"Massachusetts prosecutors withheld evidence of corrupt state narcotics testing for months from a defendant facing drug charges, and didn’t release it until after his conviction, according to newly surfaced documents and emails. The case of Rolando Penate has become a leading example for lawyers calling for further investigation into alleged misconduct by prosecutors who handled documents seized from Sonja Farak, the Amherst crime-lab chemist convicted of stealing and tampering with drug samples. Penate is seeking a new trial, contending the conviction should be reversed because of prosecutorial misconduct and evidence tainted by Farak. His is one of what lawyers say could be thousands of convictions questioned in the wake of the Farak scandal. The Farak documents indicate she used drugs on the very day she certified samples as heroin in Penate’s case. But when Penate’s lawyer tried to obtain the documents — not certain what was in them — before his client’s 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. At the time of Penate’s trial, the state Attorney General’s Office contended Farak’s misdeeds dated back only as far as 2012. To better estimate how many convictions will have to be reviewed because of Farak, the Supreme Judicial Court ordered a report on the history of her illicit behavior. The report 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. 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. Relying on an investigation conducted by state police, the judges concluded there was “no evidence of prosecutorial misconduct or obstruction of justice” in matters related to the Farak case. Several defense attorneys who called for the Velis-Merrigan investigation say the former judges and their state police investigators got it wrong. They say court records and newly released emails show prosecutors sat on evidence they were familiar with that pointed to Farak’s drug use in 2011, when she worked on Penate’s case. “I don’t know how the Velis report reached the conclusion it did after reviewing the underlying email documents,” said Randy Gioia, deputy chief counsel at the Committee for Public Counsel Services, the state’s public defender office. 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, Penate’s 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.” Prosecutors have an obligation to give the defense exculpatory evidence – including anything that could weaken evidence against defendants. Compromised drug samples often fit the definition."......... Defense attorney Luke Ryan describes finding undisclosed evidence that was seized from Sonja Farak’s car, as well as how he determined that the documents were from 2011. “It would be difficult to overstate the significance of these documents,” Ryan wrote to the Attorney General’s Office two days later. State prosecutors hadn’t provided this evidence to other district attorneys’ offices contending with the Farak fallout, either. Two weeks after Ryan’s discovery, the Attorney General’s Office shipped nearly 300 pages of previously undisclosed materials to local prosecutors around the state. “Not only did they not turn these documents over, but I wasn’t aware that they existed,” said Frank Flannery, who was the Hampden County assistant district attorney assigned to appeals following Farak’s arrest. “At the very least, we expected that we would get everything they collected in their case against Farak.” Flannery, now in private practice, said the substance abuse worksheets are “clearly relevant” to defendants challenging Farak’s analysis. Four months after Ryan found the worksheets, Judge Kinder compelled release of additional drug treatment records, which indicated Farak used a variety of drugs that she stole from the lab for years. Penate and other defendants are asking see all of Foster’s emails regarding Farak and other materials relating to the handling of evidence in the chemist’s case. A hearing on their motions is scheduled next month."
http://eye.necir.org/2016/05/28/farak-withheld-evidence/