A Bensalem man who supplied drugs to a friend who fatally overdosed on them went to state prison Tuesday for five to 10 years.

James E. Breneman, 29, wept and struggled to speak in Bucks County Common Pleas Court about the death last year of Ryan Patrick Reed, whom he had known since both were teens.

“I would gladly give my place for his any day,” Breneman said. “I will carry that with me for the rest of my life.”

Breneman had pleaded guilty Oct. 13 to charges including drug delivery resulting in death.

Reed, 25, was found dead on his bed by his father around 6 p.m. on Jan. 5, 2017, in the family's house in the 2400 block of Headhouse Square South in Bensalem. They had returned home together less than four hours earlier.

The night before, Reed had texted Breneman, wishing him a happy birthday and asking if Breneman was “still dabbling” in heroin.

They texted back and forth the next day, arranging for Breneman to buy six bags of heroin for $60, deliver five to Reed’s home and keep one for himself. Breneman concealed the red-colored packets in a flower pot outside the house shortly before Reed and his father came home.

The drugs, which Breneman said he bought that morning in North Philadelphia, turned out to contain 3-methylfentanyl, a synthetic opioid considered 100 to 200 times stronger than fentanyl.

Breneman already had snorted his share of the drugs before delivering Reed’s, later telling police that it had seemed unusually potent.

Reed, meanwhile, was especially vulnerable to overdosing, having lowered his tolerance by participating in rehab programs through the Livengrin Foundation, said Deputy District Attorney David A. Keightly Jr., who prosecuted the case.

A longtime addict himself, Breneman “would have known better than anyone else what providing a substance such as this would do to a person” who is going through recovery, Keightly said.

Judge Wallace H. Bateman Jr., who imposed the sentence, noted that if the men indeed were friends, Breneman “would have been aware that Mr. Reed was at Livengrin, trying to get sober.”  

Breneman said he regrets not refusing Reed’s request for drugs, “but it’s hard for an addict to tell another addict not to get high. I wish I had said no.”

The victim’s father, John J. Reed, said his son became addicted in 2015 to prescription drugs that his mother was taking while suffering from a terminal illness. Reed ultimately confessed his addiction to his parents and asked them to help him, the father said.

“After the initial parental shock I was so impressed by his strength and resolve to deal with his problem and have a productive life,” John Reed said in court. “He spent 33 days in rehab at Livengrin during that process and when he was released I got my son back. A man who was happy and full of life.”

Ryan Reed had started a business in early 2016, his father said. When Ryan’s mother died in August 2016, “he vowed to make her proud, to become a very successful person.”

That goal, John Reed said, “was snuffed out on Jan. 5, 2017, by a person who acted like a friend but I feel was only concerned about making money and giving drugs to an unsuspecting and trusting soul.”

Reed said that his son had continued to attend outpatient classes at Livengrin and had never failed a drug test, including one given the morning of the day he died.

“If not for the influence of James Breneman, I would have my son,” Reed said. “I have had to bury a wife and son in less than a year and the pain I am experiencing is sometimes unbearable.”

Breneman’s mother, Linda Breneman, said she understood Reed’s anguish because her family also had been riddled with loss from addiction. She said that her brother and sister had died from heroin overdoses, and that she has been in recovery for alcoholism for almost 10 years.

A psychological report on Breneman said that he had struggled with addiction since his father died of cancer during Breneman’s senior year of high school. His mother described him as caring and hardworking in spite of his drug abuse.

“Even during his addiction, he maintained a job for most of that time, but most of the money went toward his addiction, unfortunately,” Linda Breneman. “I know he has great sadness about all of this. I know that he’s remorseful.”

Deputy Public Defender Nicholas J. Williamson argued that Breneman did not sell drugs for profit and had cooperated fully with police investigators. He said Breneman had broken down in tears and said, “It should have been me” when police informed him that Reed had died.  

“It was Mr. Reed who was soliciting drugs from Mr. Breneman,” Williamson said. Breneman “sold five bags of heroin as a favor to a friend … He was [also] doing this for his own benefit to get drugs for himself. This was not for him to get rich, it was for him to get by. He was not thinking rationally.”

Bateman rejected Williamson’s request for a mitigated sentence.

“You have a drug problem. You have all kinds of problems,” the judge told Breneman, but the impact on Reed’s family and others like them “is something that most people cannot fathom.”

In addition to the prison sentence, Bateman sentenced Breneman to five years of consecutive probation. He recommended that the sentence be served in a therapeutic unit to deal with Breneman’s addiction.

“Drugs have pretty much ruined my life for the past 10 years,” Breneman said. “I would like to know what it’s like to live a life for something other than drugs.”

The case was investigated by the Bensalem Township Police Department.  

Contact: David A. Keightly Jr., 215.348.6342, dakeightly@buckscounty.org