QUOTE OF THE DAY: "After the fiasco in the drug lab, we urged tight controls of the crime lab and serious oversight by the Legislature and outside agencies. With this report about damaging practices in the Office of Alcohol Testing, that oversight takes on new urgency. Local police and prosecutors need to know the evidence they collect and bring to court is accurate and reliable. And defendants should be confident they will get a fair trial with reliable evidence that stands up to scientific scrutiny. Without that, Massachusetts residents will lose faith, and the justice system will lose credibility."
EDITORIAL: "Our view: Another failure in the state crime lab," published by The Gloucester Times on October 18, 2017.GIST: "First, it was revelations about scores of faked or tainted drug tests by the state drug lab that eventually sent a chemist to jail and threw hundreds of drug convictions into question. The damage done by poor supervision, substandard management and erratic practices at the lab continues to haunt the operation and cost taxpayers dearly for court appeals. Now, a report released Monday points the finger at the state Office of Alcohol Testing, leading to the immediate firing of the head of that office and again raising questions about whether justice was served or corrupted in thousands of drunken driving cases. In fact, defense attorneys were raising questions about the state lab that certifies alcohol breath-testing equipment several years ago. And in February, Judge Robert A. Brennan ruled after a 10-day hearing in Concord District Court that the method used by the Office of Alcohol Testing to certify the machines over a two-year period “did not produce reliable” blood-alcohol readings. At the time, Brennan ruled all readings in court cases between June 2012 and September 2014 should be excluded as evidence in drunken driving cases. In August, Daniel Bennett, secretary of the state Executive Office of Public Safety, wrote to all district attorneys in the state, telling them that the lab had withheld crucial evidence about the Alcotest 9510 breath-testing instruments from prosecuting attorneys in court cases, and said he was ordering an investigation of the process used by the Office of Alcohol Testing to calibrate the devices. It’s that investigation that brought the firing of Melissa O’Meara, head of the Office of Alcohol Testing, on Monday. Bennett vowed to hire a retired judge to “oversee determinations relating to future discovery obligations of the Office of Alcohol Testing and the larger State Police Crime Laboratory.” Monday’s report said leadership of the office “made serious errors of judgment in its responses to court-ordered discovery, errors which were enabled by a longstanding and insular institutional culture that was reflexively guarded” and “inattentive to the legal obligations borne by those whose work facilitates criminal prosecutions.” In other words, managers in the Office of Alcohol Testing didn’t give accurate information needed to prosecute cases, raising doubt about whether hundreds of criminal cases are valid. “This is going to impact every single Breathalyzer test case,” Joseph Bernard, lead counsel in the case, told the Boston Globe. “Every single breath test from 2011 to the present will be impacted by this.” It’s shocking that the crime lab is again the source of bad practices and unreliable evidence that will likely cost millions of dollars in court time and appeals, and cast suspicions over the state court system. Anyone arrested on a drunken driving charge in Massachusetts has the right to refuse a Breathalyzer test – although that refusal comes with an automatic 90-day license suspension. Given this evidence of ineptitude or malfeasance by the Office of Alcohol Testing, why wouldn’t a driver take the test, knowing that a good defense lawyer will promptly challenge the validity of the test in light of the prior bad behavior by the state lab? After the fiasco in the drug lab, we urged tight controls of the crime lab and serious oversight by the Legislature and outside agencies. With this report about damaging practices in the Office of Alcohol Testing, that oversight takes on new urgency. Local police and prosecutors need to know the evidence they collect and bring to court is accurate and reliable. And defendants should be confident they will get a fair trial with reliable evidence that stands up to scientific scrutiny. Without that, Massachusetts residents will lose faith, and the justice system will lose credibility."
The entire editorial can be found at:
http://www.gloucestertimes.com/opinion/editorials/our-view-another-failure-in-the-state-crime-lab/article_2124acba-0e9f-5b3a-a22a-52bceebbdcce.html
PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue. Keep your eye on the Charles Smith Blog for reports on developments. The Toronto Star, my previous employer for more than twenty incredible years, has put considerable effort into exposing the harm caused by Dr. Charles Smith and his protectors - and into pushing for reform of Ontario's forensic pediatric pathology system. The Star has a "topic" section which focuses on recent stories related to Dr. Charles Smith. It can be found at: http://www.thestar.com/topic/c
