The issues plaguing state crime labs like Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Massachusetts, Minnesota, North Carolina, continue to occur and people are being to acknowledge the system is overdue for sweeping reform. Now we can add New Jersey to the hall of shame.
A lab technician for the State Police allegedly faked results in a drug case, and has drawn into question 7,827 criminal cases on which he worked, according to state officials.
Kamalkant Shah worked as a laboratory technician for the State Police laboratory in Little Falls and was found to have “dry labbed” suspected marijuana, according to a Feb. 29 memo to Public Defender Joseph Krakora from Deputy Public Defender Judy Fallon. Shah’s essentially accused of making up data.
The prosecutor’s office’s plan, Fallon said, “is to submit for retesting specimens from open cases. The larger, and unanswered, question is how this impacts already resolved cases, especially those where the specimens may have been destroyed.”