Houston’s Harris County District Attorney’s Office for years ignored its obligation to inform defense lawyers about accusations that local crime lab analysts had falsified drug test results, reports the Houston Chronicle. Evidence in thousands of drug cases during the past seven years might have received closer scrutiny, defense attorneys said, if they had been informed that two police department analysts were suspected of “drylabbing” – concocting results without performing tests.
Jonathan Munier, who handled one of four cases in which it was recently revealed the two analysts were accused of faking results, said, “If they had told me that, I would have come unglued. I would have said, ‘Kiss my ass. Dismiss the whole case.’ ” District Attorney Chuck Rosenthal acknowledged that attorneys in cases involving the analysts’ work should have been notified about the improper testing.
Link: http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/front/3247023