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Crime Lab Scandal Rocks Massachusetts
NPR ^ | September 20, 2012 | by Tovia Smith

Posted on 09/23/2012 6:17:28 PM PDT by DeaconBenjamin

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1 posted on 09/23/2012 6:17:31 PM PDT by DeaconBenjamin
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To: DeaconBenjamin

“A legislative panel is looking into possible reforms. Prosecutors say the obvious answer is better oversight.”

Ya think?


2 posted on 09/23/2012 6:22:18 PM PDT by Panzerlied ("We shall never surrender!")
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To: DeaconBenjamin
This is why I've never supported drug-testing.

It is incredibly easy to "frame" somebody by doctoring a test result.

3 posted on 09/23/2012 6:23:13 PM PDT by SamAdams76
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To: DeaconBenjamin

You mean no one noticed all that time.


4 posted on 09/23/2012 6:26:28 PM PDT by freekitty (Give me back my conservative vote; then find me a real conservative to vote for)
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To: DeaconBenjamin

End this stupid war on drugs now. It’s done far more harm than good. Everything Government touches outside of it’s specifically enumerated powers it f**** up. Everything.


5 posted on 09/23/2012 6:27:16 PM PDT by Lurker (Violence is rarely the answer. But when it is it is the only answer.)
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To: DeaconBenjamin

These kinds of scandals have happened over and over. That’s why you never trust the ‘technical evidence’ over that of eyewitnesses to the alleged crime.


6 posted on 09/23/2012 6:29:02 PM PDT by starvosan
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To: DeaconBenjamin
Police running a crime lab on the cheap (She was handling three times the normal caseload) and most likely putting pressure on to convict (and hurry it up) . What could go wrong? CSI it ain't.
7 posted on 09/23/2012 6:30:01 PM PDT by fella ("As it was before Noah, so shall it be again")
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To: DeaconBenjamin
Dookhan was caught a year ago after she failed to sign out evidence and signed out evidence using aliases. She was handling three times the normal caseload.

It is well known how important the handling of evidence is, for precisely the reason that if a person handling the evidence becomes suspect, then all evidence that person has handled becomes suspect. They had procedures, as every other city does, to ensure proper handling of evidence and test results. Yet she still was able to carry on, even after she started to raise red flags? This was a management failure.

8 posted on 09/23/2012 6:33:50 PM PDT by Vince Ferrer
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To: fella

We had the same problem in San Francisco. A lot of convicted people had their cases dropped. The lab technician in question was NOT Amish.


9 posted on 09/23/2012 6:34:44 PM PDT by DIRTYSECRET
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To: DeaconBenjamin

The media here in MA has been pumping this story. Pumping it and pumping it. Like there’s nothing else to talk about. Crime lab scandal, day after day.

When I see stuff like this, I have to ask, “What is the media’s agenda?”

I say they want drug legalization. This little scandal is just a means to that end.


10 posted on 09/23/2012 6:34:47 PM PDT by ClearCase_guy (ua)
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To: DeaconBenjamin
Damned good thing I wasn't in MA when this was happening. Say what you will about podunk towns in GA, they were honest with me. I was busted for possession of crack in 2002 and it wasn't at all. Yes I had intended to buy some, but I got lucky and it wasn't anything but counterfeit. I was immediately seized by the police, but the lab test cleared me (eighteen months later).

In MA, I would have gotten a felony. The perp who did this needs HARD TIME BEHIND BARS.

11 posted on 09/23/2012 6:35:56 PM PDT by Lazamataz (Gingers have no souls.)
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To: Lurker

You have the answer.


12 posted on 09/23/2012 6:36:04 PM PDT by JLS
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To: Panzerlied

ya they going to lett all their drug dealers out a jail for free.


13 posted on 09/23/2012 6:41:08 PM PDT by dalebert
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To: DeaconBenjamin
Because of my work, I take 4 to 8 drug tests a year. Three years ago I failed a test because I had metaprolol in my system. It's the generic form of Lopressor. It's used to control blood pressure and atrial fibrillation, of which I have both.

When I inquired, I was told that I had a controlled substance in my blood. It's a freaking beta blocker! I had showed the lab my prescription before hand.

Same lab had passed me six times before. Idiots.

14 posted on 09/23/2012 6:50:20 PM PDT by Focault's Pendulum (Obama A man without an American mission.)
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To: fella

Police running a crime lab on the cheap (She was handling three times the normal caseload) and most likely putting pressure on to convict (and hurry it up) . What could go wrong? CSI it ain’t.
**********************************************
The DA’s want convictions , they want the “right” lab result , they’re all on “the same team” ... management was involved by simply ignoring the problems ... and the overworked lab tech is low man on the totem pole ...


15 posted on 09/23/2012 6:51:00 PM PDT by Neidermeyer
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To: DeaconBenjamin

This is why we should have the biblical “two or three witnesses” required for a conviction.

Just a drug lab test shouldn’t cut it.

The drug test; a witness; the testimony of someone who says he boasted of being a drug dealer. That’s three witnesses in my book, and if on a jury, I’d vote to convict.

Not on just a drug test.

The problem here is not the “war on drugs.” The problem is the wrongly prosecuted war on drugs. Do it right. Two or three witnesses.


16 posted on 09/23/2012 6:53:40 PM PDT by Persevero (Homeschooling for Excellence since 1992)
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To: Focault's Pendulum

There could be several reasons why you were passed previously, including test sensitivity to the substance, or a metabolic situation in your body that produced more concentrated levels on the test that day.


17 posted on 09/23/2012 6:55:23 PM PDT by ican'tbelieveit (School is prison for children who have commited the crime of being born. (attr: St_Thomas_Aquinas))
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To: Panzerlied

My guess is that this will all boil down to hack-hiring and affirmative action hiring.


18 posted on 09/23/2012 7:01:02 PM PDT by MSF BU (n)
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To: DeaconBenjamin
>""Any person who's been convicted of a drug crime in the last several years whose drugs were tested at the lab was very potentially a victim of a very substantial miscarriage of justice,"

So if you weigh the same as a duck?

When will the persecutions end?

19 posted on 09/23/2012 7:04:56 PM PDT by rawcatslyentist (I'd rather have a bottle in front of me, than a Barack 0b0tt0my!)
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To: ican'tbelieveit
There could be several reasons why you were passed previously, including test sensitivity to the substance, or a metabolic situation in your body that produced more concentrated levels on the test that day.

I have passed over 50 drug tests since 2001. Always on this medication. This was not a metabolic reaction. this was a screw up by a lab tech who didn't know the difference between a beta blocker and a narcotic.

I had to fight it and get another independent lab to refute the results. That was six months out of my life.

20 posted on 09/23/2012 7:12:14 PM PDT by Focault's Pendulum (Obama A man without an American mission.)
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