10 things we know about drug lab scandal

The investigation into drug thefts from the Controlled Substances Lab in the former Office of the Chief Medical Examiner remains ongoing, but court proceedings and a preliminary report have put a number of things about the scandal in the public record:

1. Between 2010 and Feb. 20, 2014, at least one, and possibly more than one, employee at the state's only crime testing lab, was stealing drugs from police evidence envelopes that were sent to the lab for testing. At least 52 incidents of tampering were found during an audit of drug evidence stored at the lab.

2. The evidence that was compromised had been submitted by a variety of police agencies from across the state.

3. A variety of drugs were taken by the thief or thieves, including heroin, cocaine, marijuana and Oxycontin.

4. So far there does not appear to be a pattern to the thefts. Some of the compromised evidence had been tested at the lab before drugs were removed, while some drugs were taken before the lab technicians broke the evidence seal to test the drugs.

5. Police and prosecutors should have been able to track exactly who handled each piece of evidence – as required by law – but security policies and procedures were substandard or not followed at the lab, making such determinations difficult if not impossible.

6. The door to the Wilmington office of the medical examiner's building was sometimes propped open, and furthermore the door to the drug evidence vault was sometimes propped open. Some employees also had unsupervised access to the building and facilities on weekends and nights, according to testimony.

7. Investigators found rolls of police "evidence tape" in the vault area – used by police agencies to seal evidence envelopes – that were not supposed to be in that area or in the building.

8. Two employees have been arrested and charged as a result of the investigation, but it is unclear how those prosecutions relate to the thefts at the lab or if either defendant can be conclusively tied to the thefts. James W. Woodson, a forensic investigator, is accused of possession of cocaine, theft of a controlled substance and tampering with physical evidence. Farnam Daneshgar, a chemist, is facing two counts of falsifying business records, possession of marijuana and possession of drug paraphernalia.

9. Longtime chief medical examiner Dr. Richard Callery has been fired and the department is being reorganized as part of the Delaware Department of Safety and Homeland Security. It also has been renamed the Division of Forensic Science. Callery is not suspected in the thefts but is under investigation for improperly using his office to run a private consulting business on state time.

10. The legal status of some 200 pending drug prosecutions from 2010-14 and thousands of drug convictions from those years remains uncertain. A judge held two lengthy hearings on the issue in July and August and is not expected to rule until October at the earliest. Hundreds of drug cases have been dropped and other defendants have received favorable plea deals as a result of the scandal.

Contact Sean O'Sullivan at (302) 324-2777 or sosullivan@delawareonline.com or on Twitter @SeanGOSullivan