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TRAILER:
https://youtu.be/X4Hk1lOGWIA
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PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "I hadn't heard of the cases at the center of Drug Scandal before settling in for Carr's new four-parter on Netflix, which is odd in retrospect, because the story has a number of elements that are like true-crime-catnip. First of all, it's a scam/faker story in the Stephen Glass mold: Annie Dookhan, the first scientist to be unmasked, was a stereotypical "striver" (a very Edith Wharton way to describe this particular sort of frustrated overachiever, but one of the interviewees in Drug Scandal uses that exact word). Dookhan skipped procedures and mocked up results in order to look more productive than her colleagues, and even generated dummy emails in order to flirt by proxy with a handsome ADA, while dwelling in delusions of law-enforcement grandeur. Then there's the simultaneously enraging and pathetic addiction story at the center of the second unmasking: Sonja Farak, a good student and the first girl in her state to play high-school football. Farak wasn't faking results, but she was raiding the drug lockup — first the methamphetamine used for comparative testing at the lab, then evidence assigned to her for testing. Farak even made her own crack cocaine, and while she later claimed that she always tried to do a good job on the tests, the better to avoid detection, obviously any lab report she signed off during that period is suspect... and those lab reports were myriad."
REVIEW: "Netflix's engaging, enraging 'How to fix a drug scandal is like crime catnip," by Sarah D. Downing, published by Primetimer on March 31, 2020. (Primetimer editor-at-large Sarah D. Bunting knows a thing or two about true crime. She founded the true crime site The Blotter, and is the host of its weekly podcast, The Blotter Presents. Her new weekly column here on Primetimer is dedicated to all things true crime on TV.)
SUB_HEADING: "Two rogue lab techs plus tens of thousands of cases equals a criminal justice outrage.
GIST: "The "fix" in the title of Erin Lee Carr's latest documentary project, How To Fix A Drug Scandal, works on two different levels. One meaning is to repair — repairing the damage done to trial outcomes and reputations by two separate state-lab scientists in Massachusetts whose results were, at best, unreliable. The other definition of "to fix" is "to manipulate," to rig an outcome, as it seems various people in the Massachusetts prosecutorial system tried to do once it became clear they'd have to throw out tens of thousands of drug cases.
I hadn't heard of the cases at the center of Drug Scandal before settling in for Carr's new four-parter on Netflix, which is odd in retrospect, because the story has a number of elements that are like true-crime-catnip. First of all, it's a scam/faker story in the Stephen Glass mold: Annie Dookhan, the first scientist to be unmasked, was a stereotypical "striver" (a very Edith Wharton way to describe this particular sort of frustrated overachiever, but one of the interviewees in Drug Scandal uses that exact word). Dookhan skipped procedures and mocked up results in order to look more productive than her colleagues, and even generated dummy emails in order to flirt by proxy with a handsome ADA, while dwelling in delusions of law-enforcement grandeur.
Then there's the simultaneously enraging and pathetic addiction story at the center of the second unmasking: Sonja Farak, a good student and the first girl in her state to play high-school football. Farak wasn't faking results, but she was raiding the drug lockup — first the methamphetamine used for comparative testing at the lab, then evidence assigned to her for testing. Farak even made her own crack cocaine, and while she later claimed that she always tried to do a good job on the tests, the better to avoid detection, obviously any lab report she signed off during that period is suspect... and those lab reports were myriad.
Drug Scandal also boasts several experienced talking-head commentators (including Rolling Stone's Paul Solotaroff, also seen in Amazon's Free Meek); and clear, process sequences that take viewers through the average day in the life of a bench scientist; how heroin travels from Afghanistan through the mid-Atlantic ports, gets branded, and arrives in New England; and how an overwhelmed scientist like Dookhan pulls off "dry-labbing," generating reports on testing she didn't actually perform. Carr's direction is at times too deliberate — an audience that chooses to watch Drug Scandal is likely versed in true-crime jargon, and doesn't need exculpatory evidence and Brady violations reviewed for them this carefully — and while it's always tempting to bag on The War On Drugs with quaint footage making (bigger) fools of past presidents, it's not a great use of time. But with those exceptions noted, Drug Scandal moves right along to that last critical element of a compelling true-crime narrative: the miscarriage of justice, which the miscarriers blandly assert was just a mistake, an oversight, or not a miscarriage at all. (The fact that much of the state's motivation to dissemble derived from a petty disdain for one particular defense attorney is both contemptible and sad... much like Farak's behavior itself.)
Drug Scandal is a worthwhile four hours spent covering a case that isn't as well known as it should be. Not only does it lend itself to Lifetime-movie fantasy-casting while you're watching, it's also well made; Erin Lee Carr is a very good director who's also exceptionally consistent in the quality of her output (see below), and Alex Gibney (Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room) is one of the executive producers..."
The entire review can be read at:
https://www.primetimer.com/features/how-to-fix-a-drug-scandal-on-the-biggest-case-youve-never-heard-of
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/charlessmith. Information on "The Charles Smith Blog Award"- and its nomination process - can be found at: http://smithforensic.blogspot.com/2011/05/charles-smith-blog-award-nominations.html Please send any comments or information on other cases and issues of interest to the readers of this blog to: hlevy15@gmail.com. Harold Levy: Publisher: The Charles Smith Blog;
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FINAL WORD: (Applicable to all of our wrongful conviction cases): "Whenever there is a wrongful conviction, it exposes errors in our criminal legal system, and we hope that this case — and lessons from it — can prevent future injustices."
Lawyer Radha Natarajan:
Executive Director: New England Innocence Project;
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