Jones v. Han

993 F. Supp. 2d 57, 2014 WL 320575, 2014 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 10202
CourtDistrict Court, D. Massachusetts
DecidedJanuary 28, 2014
DocketCivil No. 13-11196-FDS
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 993 F. Supp. 2d 57 (Jones v. Han) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, D. Massachusetts primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Jones v. Han, 993 F. Supp. 2d 57, 2014 WL 320575, 2014 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 10202 (D. Mass. 2014).

Opinion

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER ON DEFENDANTS’ MOTIONS TO DISMISS

SAYLOR, District Judge.

This is a suit under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 arising out of the falsification of drug tests at the William F. Hinton Drug Laboratory in Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts, by chemist Annie Dookhan.

In 2010, plaintiff David Jones was convicted of distribution of crack cocaine and sentenced to a term of imprisonment of five years. His conviction was based in part on drug-analysis evidence produced by Dookhan at the Hinton Laboratory. He was released from custody, after more than two years of imprisonment, when it was discovered that Dookhan had been fraudulently producing false drug-analysis reports.

[61]*61Jones contends that Dookhan’s supervisors at the laboratory violated his constitutional rights by failing to disclose her fraud during his criminal prosecution. Defendant Linda Han was the director of the Hinton Laboratory during the relevant time. She has moved to dismiss the claims against her, contending she did not know of Dookhan’s conduct, did not have a legal obligation to correct it, and did not act with deliberate indifference as to her conduct. Han further contends that she is entitled to qualified immunity as to plaintiffs claims. Defendant Julie Nassif was Han’s supervisor and in charge of the Division of Analytical Chemistry within the Department of Health during plaintiffs arrest, conviction, and imprisonment. She has likewise moved to dismiss on the ground of qualified immunity.

For the following reasons, defendants’ motions will be denied.

I.Background

A. Factual Background

The facts are set forth below as alleged in the complaint.

1. The Hinton Laboratorg

The William F. Hinton Drug Laboratory in Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts, was operated by the Department of Health and Human Services for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Julie Nassif was in charge of the Division of Analytical Chemistry within the Department of Public Health. Linda Han was the Director of the laboratory. Charles Salemi was the Supervisor of Operations at the laboratory.

2.Plaintiff’s Criminal Prosecution

David Jones was arrested on March 8, 2010, on charges of distribution of a Class B substance (crack cocaine) and distribution within a school zone. The substances seized from him were tested at the Hinton Laboratory in April 2010 by chemists Annie Dookhan and Kate Corbett. Dookhan was the primary chemist; she was responsible for logging the alleged drugs in and out of the evidence safe and had custody of the drugs whenever they were outside the safe. It was also her responsibility to perform the preliminary testing to see if the alleged drugs were actually crack cocaine.

Dookhan testified at Jones’s trial. She opined that the substance was crack cocaine. On September 2, 2010, Jones was convicted on both charges. He was sentenced to five years in prison.1

After information about Dookhan’s misconduct came to light, Jones was released from custody. In March 2013, his conviction was reversed and the Commonwealth declined to prosecute him further.

No information concerning possible misconduct at the Hinton Laboratory, or deficiencies in the laboratory’s policies or procedures, was disclosed to Jones during the prosecution of his case.

3.Dookhan’s Misconduct

Dookhan has admitted to various types of misconduct concerning the drug analy-ses she performed at the Hinton Laboratory. First, she has admitted that she falsified positive results by intentionally contaminating samples with narcotics if initial tests showed they were not narcotics. Second, she has admitted to so-called “dry labbing,” or determining what drug a substance was by looking at it rather than analyzing the substance chemically. Third, she has admitted to forging the signatures of two other chemists, Kate [62]*62Corbett and Dan Renczowski, thereby falsely indicating that they had .chemically analyzed a particular substance. Fourth, she has admitted to forging the initials of the evidence officer to remove samples from the lab’s safe without authority. Fifth, she has admitted to forging quality-assurance and quality-control documents, falsely claiming that she calibrated drug-analysis machines in the laboratory. Finally, she has admitted that she falsely claimed that she had a master’s degree, both on her resume and while testifying under oath.

Dookhan was indicted in Suffolk Superi- or Court on December 17, 2012, on various charges, including perjury and evidence tampering. She was subsequently indicted in five other counties for similar offenses. On November 22, 2013, she pleaded guilty to 27 of those criminal charges, and was sentenced to a term of three to five years in prison.

4. Quality Control Procedures at the Hinton Laboratory

Plaintiff alleges that the practices, procedures, and policies at the Hinton Laboratory were deficient in assuring proper drug analysis. He asserts two principal contentions.

First, he contends that Dookhan and other chemists had unrestricted access to the laboratory’s evidence safe, which was open and unattended when the laboratory was busy. There was no computerized mechanism for tracking entry into the evidence room, and evidence officers were not always careful when it came to tracking samples and monitoring access to that room. Dookhan was allowed to obtain access to the evidence computers to enter and look up data even after she had been suspended from her laboratory duties. After the laboratory was closed, investigators found drug samples strewn about, including some that were discovered in desks and filing cabinets and some that were 15 years old.

Second, plaintiff contends that the laboratory had insufficient quality-assurance and quality-control policies and procedures. The laboratory’s standard operating procedures had not been updated since 2004, and did not meet quality-control standards recommended by the Scientific Working Group for the Analysis of Seized Drugs. In addition, the laboratory was not accredited by the International Organization for Standardization, which has promulgated standards exceeding the working group’s guidelines.

In fiscal year 2008, quality-control reviews at the Hinton Laboratory were conducted by the individual chemists. No outside organization oversaw quality control at the laboratory. The laboratory also failed to employ mechanisms in order to detect unusual or unacceptable occurrences relating to quality, such as logs for discrepancies or adverse events. Accepted laboratory standards require such logs or an equivalent process to identify and monitor quality; according to plaintiff, all seventeen other laboratories within the same building maintained such logs.

Although the laboratory did have a confirmatory chemist check the work of the primary chemist who first tested a sample, when a different result was obtained, that chemist simply returned the sample to the primary chemist. There was no centralized process for tracking the number of returns to each chemist. Dookhan herself was the chemist in charge of quality control at the Hinton Laboratory.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
993 F. Supp. 2d 57, 2014 WL 320575, 2014 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 10202, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/jones-v-han-mad-2014.