Mother who lost her baby in rogue lab tests scandal

A MOTHER told last night how her baby was nearly taken for adoption because of a false test result from a firm at the centre of Britain’s biggest forensics scandal.

The woman said she was wrongly kept apart from her one- year- old daughter by social workers after a blood alcohol test mistakenly stated the mother had been drinking heavily. She said it was only because she spotted the error herself and insisted the sample be re- examined that she was eventually reunited with her child and received an apology from Trimega Laboratories, which carried out the test.

It is just one example of a staggering 30,000 drug and alcohol tests carried out by Trimega that are being treated as unreliable.

It i s feared the suspect test results may have led to innocent people l osing their jobs or having children taken into care. Police are also reviewing another 10,000 tests carried out by two former Trimega scientists at Randox Testing Services in cases including rapes and murders.

Speaking exclusively to The Mail on Sunday, the mother – who cannot be named for legal reasons – said last night: ‘I am horrified to hear that so many people might potentially be victims of this and have lost their children. Had I not been so persistent they would have done this to me. It will haunt me for the rest of my life. I had 18 months of hell.’

In another case, Trimega claimed a mother- of- two had been taking cocaine but later admitted in the High Court that its hair analysis had been ‘erroneous and unreliable’.

The Mail on Sunday first reported in February how a miscarriage of justice inquiry was under way after suspicions were raised that rogue scientists at Manchester-based Randox had tampered with evidence in 484 cases. The police investigation led officers to extend their inquiry to Trimega and now the full extent of the scandal can be disclosed. Trimega once boasted it was responsible for 40 per cent of the 17,000 analyses of hair for drugs and alcohol carried out in Britain each year. As Ministers admitted last week that ‘ ‘all tests carried out b by the firm between 2010 and 2014 are currently being t treated as potentially unreliable’, it could mean as many as 34,000 cases falling under suspicion.

The firm went bust in 2014 and its records are feared to have been lost. The Department for Education has written to councils asking for details of cases where they used Trimega to test parents for drugs or alcohol.

Two scientists who worked at both Trimega and Randox have been arrested by Greater Manchester Police. They were questioned on suspicion of perverting the course of justice and later bailed.

Trimega’s founder Avi Lasarow said in a statement: ‘I sold my interest in Trimega Laboratories as part of a sale of the business in its entirety to Ingemino in February 2012.

‘This was following due diligence undertaken on behalf of the buyer. Following the sale no issues were raised with me by the buyers.’