7,827 N.J. Criminal Cases In Possible Jeopardy After Lab Tech Allegedly Faked Drug Results

A State Police lab technician allegedly faked drug test results, possibly putting 7,827 criminal cases on which he worked in jeopardy, according to state officials.

A memo released Wednesday from Passaic County Deputy Public Defender Judith Fallon details allegations of fraud at the State Police Forensic Lab in Little Falls, a laboratory that is likely used by many law enforcement agencies across a number of New Jersey counties, according to the New Jersey Municipal Court Law Update Service’s website.

The memo says laboratory technician Kamalkant Shah of the New Jersey State Police Laboratory in Little Falls has been found to have “dry labbed” suspected CDS specimens.

“Basically, he was observed writing ‘test results’ for suspected marijuana that was never tested,” according to the memo. “In Passaic County alone, the universe of cases possibly implicated in this conduct is 2,100.”

Shah was removed from lab work on Dec. 10 as soon as the problem was discovered, Peter Aseltine, spokesman for the Office of the Attorney General, told NJ Advance Media, noting the state is reviewing all 7,827 statewide cases that Shah worked on for review since he began working in the North Regional Lab Drug Unit in 2005.

Ellie Honig, director of the Division of Criminal Justice, acknowledged in Feb. 22 letter to county prosecutor’s offices that Shah “failed to appropriately conduct laboratory analyses in a drug case.” The Attorney General’s Office released a copy of the letter to NJ Advance Media Wednesday.

“Mr. Shah was observed in one case spending insufficient time analyzing a substance to determine if it was marijuana and recording an anticipated result without properly conducting the analysis,” Honig wrote to the media company.

“Mr. Shah was employed with the lab from 2005 to 2015; obviously all his “results” have been called into question. In Passaic County alone, the universe of cases possibly implicated in this conduct is 2,100. The Prosecutor’s Office is still in the process of identifying them. Their plan is to submit for retesting specimens from open cases,” Fallon wrote.

Fallon noted that the the larger, and unanswered, question is how this impacts already resolved cases, especially those where the specimens may have been destroyed.

“The Prosecutor’s Office has not formulated a policy or protocol yet to deal with these cases; they are still in the process of identifying them. I was told that the Little Falls laboratory is used by many other law enforcement agencies besides those in Passaic County,” he wrote. “This is a developing situation, and I will keep you informed as more details come to light.

Shah’s Linkedin profile says he’s worked as a forensic scientist for 27 years, including the New Jersey State Police’s Office of Forensic Science. He worked at the State Police’s equine testing laboratory in East Rutherford from Oct. 1989 to March 2005 before beginning work at the Little Falls lab in April 2005.