DA Rachael Rollins Moves to Vacate Guilty Pleas of “64 Innocent Individuals”

SJC Filing Provides Proactive Response to Hinton Drug Lab Malfeasance

BOSTON, May 11, 2020 – Suffolk County District Attorney Rachael Rollins today asked the state Supreme Judicial Court to vacate guilty pleas of 64 people who pleaded guilty to 91 drug charges before the state’s scandal-tainted drug laboratory was able to test the substances -- tests which later showed the substances were not illegal drugs.

In a pleading captioned Commonwealth v. 64 Innocent Individuals, Rollins’ Office is working to close another chapter on the biggest crime lab scandal in U.S. history. Rollins committed to a new review of cases which found that these 64 individuals pleaded guilty without having actually possessed controlled substances and have, for more than a decade, suffered the consequences of a criminal record after serving their sentences.

“These cases highlight the pernicious effect of mandatory minimums on plea deals,’’ said District Attorney Rollins. “Defendants have no bargaining power in plea deals. Faced with long sentences if they go to trial and lose, as well as the threat of additional charges if the deal is not accepted, defendants very often accept a deal. In these specific cases, 64 defendants engaged in the calculus of plea bargaining without knowledge of evidence of their innocence or the gross misconduct in the Hinton Lab. Justice for them is required.

“I want to thank former CPCS attorney Christopher Post and former ACLU technologist Paola Villarreal for their outstanding work in identifying this significant miscarriage of justice and bringing it to the attention of my office.

“I also want to thank attorney Luke Ryan for his dogged pursuit of answers for his clients. Without him, we would never have known the extent of the outrageous, deceptive, and criminal behavior occurring in our drug labs.’’

Rollins’ Office is the first in the state to take affirmative action on this subset of drug cases linked to the state laboratory. Collateral consequences of a criminal conviction can have life-long impact on an individual’s capacity to gain employment, secure housing, and use government benefits.

It is constitutionally mandated that every defendant have true and accurate discovery provided to them and when prosecutors learn of new evidence that evidence must be disclosed. Vacating these pleas, as the motion states, is “a remedy not simply as a matter of obligation, but is in service to justice.”

Once the sentences are vacated, the District Attorney’s Office will proceed on several fronts: Nolle prosequis will be entered in each matter; if the individuals request their records to be expunged the Office will move expeditiously; and the DA’s Office will review Board of Probation records to determine if individuals had subsequent convictions that resulted in harsher sentences because of their tainted pleas in these cases, and work to adjust those sentences.

Furthermore, the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office is reviewing policies to ensure that any future pleas are not impacted by the logistics of drug certification. The files in the cases were destroyed, pursuant to statutory file retention guidelines prior to DA Rollins assuming the office, so it could not be determined if the office ever received the certificates of analysis, or if they were ever shared with defendants following plea hearings.

The Hinton lab employed two chemists, Annie Dookhan and Sonja Farak, who, together and separately from 2003 to 2012 created a “tragic legacy” of “egregious misconduct’’ that resulted in their work over a period of 10 years being invalidated. The SJC ordered more than 21,000 drug convictions overturned as a result of faulty testing at the Hinton Lab, and some 8,000 cases with 11,162 individual defendants because of misconduct related to the Amherst Lab, where Farak subsequently worked. While the cases related to this motion to vacate were not specifically impacted Dookhan’s and Farak’s misconduct, reparations are needed. As the filing states: “Because 64 individuals here accepted accountability, pleaded guilty, and were convicted without receiving exculpatory evidence, their constitutional rights were violated. The Commonwealth now requests that this Court remedy these constitutional violations by vacating their guilty pleas.”

The issue addressed in today’s pleading was discovered by Wood & Nathanson attorney Christopher Post, who joined the firm after spending five years at the Committee for Public Counsel Services, where he was a member of the Drug Lab Crisis Litigation Unit, a task force created to deal with the fallout of the scandal. Post said he was reviewing an on-line submission from a victim of the scandal and saw in the database that had been created that the defendant’s drug certificate was negative. Further digging in collaboration with the ACLU resulted in a new database of hundreds of names from defendants around the state where drug tests were negative, even though pleas had been accepted.

“I am grateful that the Suffolk DAs Office was willing to listen and collaborate on this,’’ said Post. “None of this happened while DA Rollins was in office, but to her credit, she dedicated the time and resources to make sure that justice was ultimately done in these cases."

Suffolk County District Attorney Rachael Rollins’ office serves the communities of Boston, Chelsea, Revere, and Winthrop, Mass. The office handles over 25,000 cases a year. More than 160 attorneys in the office practice in nine district and municipal courts, Suffolk Superior Court, the Massachusetts Appeals Court, the Supreme Judicial Court, and the Boston Juvenile Courts. The office employs some 300 people and offers a wide range of services and programs to serve anyone who comes in contact with the criminal justice system. This office is committed to educating the public about the services we provide, our commitment to crime prevention, and our dedication to keeping the residents of Suffolk County safe.