Former Corrections Officer Sentenced For Attempting To Smuggle Drugs Into Prison

A former Bucks County corrections officer has been sentenced to prison after attempting to smuggle drugs.

John Christopher Dingle, 36, of Philadelphia, was sentenced by Judge Rea Boylan earlier this month to six to 23 months behind bars for trying to sneak suboxone, a drug commonly used to treat opiate addiction, into the Bucks County Correctional Facility in Doylestown for $500. He  also is required to serve two years of consecutive probation and four years of concurrent probation for possession with intent to deliver a controlled substance, according to the Bucks County District Attorney’s Office.

Dingle has claimed the crime was a slip up in a moment of weakness for an inmate who had helped him maintain order in the prison. The former corrections officer said he at first denied the inmate’s request for a “favor” but later gave in and tried to smuggle strips of suboxone from the inmate’s girlfriend into the prison.

The prisoner’s girlfriend worked with county law enforcement during the investigation, which ended with Dingle being apprehended by Doylestown Township officers as he pulled up to the prison to begin his shift, authorities said.

The arrest happened in June 2015 only minutes after Dingle met with an undercover officers posing as the inmate’s girlfriend in the parking lot of the Barn Plaza movie theater across from the prison.

“When I think about it, I wish I could go back in time, which I can’t,” Dingle said in court. “I should have just left that first `no’ at `no.’ I didn’t think about the consequences.”

Michael Parlow, Dingle’s attorney, told Boylan that his client would have not brought suboxone to the prison if not baited by the inmate, who was a police informant in a drug investigation at the jail.

Dingle had about 15 family members and friends in court for his sentencing. His wife told Boylan his family, including three children, were “still suffering because of what he did.”

Deputy District Attorney Thomas Gannon said Dingle had “proven himself not to be worthy of that trust” as a law enforcement officer.

At sentencing, Boylan said Dingle can serve his sentence at a prison outside of Bucks County due to his former role as a corrections officer.