Pubdate: Wed, 09 Jan 2013
Source: Boston Globe (MA)
Copyright: 2013 Globe Newspaper Company
Contact: http://services.bostonglobe.com/news/opeds/letter.aspx?id=6340
Website: http://bostonglobe.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/52
Author: Brian Ballou, Globe Staff
Note: Andrea Estes of the Globe staff contributed to this report.

EX-CHEMIST'S HUSBAND WARNED PROSECUTOR SHE WAS A LIAR

New Details In Lab Scandal

The husband of disgraced chemist Annie Dookhan warned a prosecutor
that his wife was a chronic liar in -ominous text messages nearly two
years before she was finally caught improperly removing drug evidence
from a state lab, according to new State -Police documents obtained by
the Globe.

Surren Dookhan has not spoken publicly about his wife's free fall from
prolific chemist to the defendant at the heart of the biggest law
enforce-ment scandal in recent Massachusetts history.

But former assistant -Norfolk district attorney George Papachristos
told -police that Dookhan's husband contacted him in August 2009 after
he befriended -Annie Dookhan.

"This is Annie's husband do not believe her, she's a liar, she's
always lying," Surren Dookhan texted to the prosecutor, according to
an interview Papachristos gave to State Police on Oct. 3, 2012. "She
is looking for sympathy and attention."

Surren Dookhan's warning did not prevent Papachristos from continuing
a friendly, sometimes personal correspondence with Annie Dookhan that
ultimately forced him to resign his position when their e-mail
exchanges became public late last year. Dookhan has been indicted on
27 counts of obstructing justice and altering drug evidence, casting
doubt on the reliability of her work in thousands of cases.

The Papachristos interview is among of a raft of new documents
obtained by the Globe that show both the depths of Dookhan's deception
and the ineffectiveness of her bosses at the Jamaica Plain lab. For
- -example, Dookhan had a key to the evidence safe for six months after
she was caught improperly removing 90 drug samples in June 2011.

The State Police documents provide new details on Dookhan's alleged
misconduct in three of the six cases in which she faces charges for
certifying that a sample contained illegal drugs when it did not.

In one 2010 Boston case, Dookhan certified that a sample taken from
Miguel Vasquez contained cocaine when re-testing showed the substance
was inositol, which is often sold as a dietary supplement at natural
food stores.

In two other Boston cases, the documents show defendants Paul
Flannelly and -Stephen Goudreau were prosecuted for drug possession
based on evidence that contained no illegal drugs.

Already, prosecutors have released at least 159 defendants who were
convicted based on drug analyses by Dookhan, who cultivated close
relationships with prosecutors, even telling one that she saw her job
as getting drug dealers "off the street."

The new documents include a State Police interview with the former
director of the -Hinton Lab in Jamaica Plain, Dr. Linda Han, in which
she said she had a few suspicions about Dookhan before June 2011 when
she learned that Dookhan had violated lab protocol by remov-ing drug
samples from the safe.

In the Nov. 19 interview, Han said she did ask why other chemists in
the lab were not able to analyze as many drug samples as Dookhan.

But she said Dookhan's -direct supervisor, Julie Nassif, answered that
some samples were more complicated than others and chemists often had
other duties -besides testing.

"It never occurred to Dr. Han that Annie Dookhan was doing too many
cases," the inves-tigators said in their -report.

Dookhan has since admitted to investigators that she was able to keep
up the pace in part by "dry-labbing" many samples, which means she
falsely certified she tested samples when she had merely made a visual
examination.

Han said she did consider whether Dookhan's improper removal of drug
samples from the safe had compromised the overall integrity of the
testing. But she said Nassif told her there was not a problem. Dookhan
was taken off testing but still kept the key to the evidence lockup.

Even when Han learned that Dookhan had forged colleagues' initials on
multiple documents, Han continued to waver on what to do with Dookhan,
according to the -report.

Eventually, Han relayed the situation to labor relations, telling an
official in that office she thought the matter was a "simple
disciplinary issue." The official told her it was serious and should
"go up the chain."

Han briefed Commissioner John Auerbach about Dookhan in her office in
December 2011. An internal investigation was launched soon afterward,
and Dookhan was placed on admin-istrative leave. When Han discovered
in early 2012 that Dookhan also had falsified her resume, she
considered terminating Dookhan, according to the report.

Dookhan finally resigned in March 2012, and Han and -Auerbach resigned
a few months later, while Nassif was terminated. Governor Deval
Patrick shut down the lab in August and transferred responsibility for
drug testing to the State Police.

Dookhan's alleged misdeeds may affect tens of thousands of cases and
cost taxpayers millions by the time investigations are completed.

She has pleaded not guilty to all criminal charges and remains free on
$10,000 cash bail.

On Wednesday, Dookhan is scheduled to be arraigned on charges of
obstruction of justice in Middlesex and Norfolk counties. In those
cases, she is accused of lying in court by testifying that she had a
master's degree.

Nicolas Gordon, Dookhan's attorney, did not return calls Tuesday
seeking comment.

After Dookhan's arraignment in December, she and her husband walked
hand-in-hand past reporters and photographers, remaining silent.

But three years earlier, -Annie Dookhan had told -Papachristos she was
having marital problems, prompting several attempts by her husband to
contact Papachristos.

"I got 8 text messages on my work cellphone from your cell, and they
[sic] according to the messages, they were from your husband. He said
a few things that didn't make any sense to me," wrote Papachristos to
Dookhan on Aug. 12, 2009. "I have to tell my bosses because it was on
my work cell and he made several accusations that have no basis."

But Papachristos told investigators that Surren Dookhan did not say
anything in the texts about the possibility of Papachristos having an
affair with his wife, something -Papachristos has said did not happen.

Instead, Papachristos said Dookhan warned him that -Annie Dookhan was
"looking for sympathy or currying -favor" with him.
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