Southern Md. Police Beat / Paul Daniel Panholzer eating his drug mail in jail

Paul Daniel Panholzer eating his drug mail in jail

LEONARDTOWN, MD. — According to many griping and whining inmates of the St. Mary’s County Jail, known to many as the Hotel St. Mary’s, the diet served to prisoners includes cockroaches.  One inmate had an idea for a way to improve his diet and fuel his quest to be a brain-dead druggie and keep in touch with his druggie friends on the outside.

His solution? 

To have his pen pals soak his love letters in Suboxone.

According to Commander of Vice, Captain Daniel Alioto, the St. Mary’s County Sheriff’s Office Vice/Narcotics detectives received information that an inmate, Paul Daniel Panholzer, 32, was receiving mail into the jail which was tainted with “Suboxone”.

During the course of the investigation, evidence was recovered from his cell as well as from intercepted incoming mail.

Alioto reports that letters were being sent in the secure facility after being soaked in the drug. Once inside the jail, Panholzer would eat the paper to ingest the drug. According to police, he was indicted and charged with several criminal charges including “Introducing Contraband into a Detention Facility”. At least one additional arrest is expected as a result of this investigation.

Panholzer was a resident of 45186 Take It Easy Ranch Road in Callaway, Md., until his arrest and incarceration.

On July 22, 2015, Panholzer was charged with multiple charges of drug possession by St. Mary’s Deputy Keith Moritz. On Nov. 10, 2015, St. Mary’s States Attorney Richard Fritz dropped all the charges.

With multiple accounts of burglary, property destruction and theft charges facing him, Panholzer was given a plea deal by St. Mary’s States Attorney Fritz on Dec. 14, 2015, and sent to jail for 90 days.

Panholzer also faced multiple counts of burglary in Charles County Circuit Court for burglary work he performed in that county on Jan. 26, 2015. With a taxpayer-provided free attorney working to keep him out of the clink, he went to trial on June 5, 2015. In a plea deal with Charles County States Attorney Tony Covington, Panholzer was given a 20-year sentence suspended to only having to serve 1 year. The Charles County deal allowed him to serve his sentence closer to home in St. Mary’s County so his druggie pen pals could use cheaper stamps to mail him his love letters.

In an unrelated drug investigation, Mirone Dewayne Smith, 44, of Lexington Park, Md., was arrested and charged with “Possession of Methadone”.