Former Canton pharmacist accused of smuggling fake prescriptions into Trumbull prison

Staff report

WARREN

A criminal case is pending in Trumbull County Common Pleas Court alleging a former Canton pharmacist tried to smuggle two forged prescriptions to a former Trumbull Correctional Institute inmate in a book in 2015.

Prison officials were alerted to the enterprise and intercepted the prescriptions before the inmate, Joel C. White, 32, could get them.

White pleaded guilty recently before Judge Pete Kontos to aggravated drug trafficking, drug trafficking, theft of drugs, illegally conveying drugs into a prison and engaging in a pattern of corrupt activity. He is expected to get about three years in prison at his June 25 sentencing hearing.

Gina Buccino Arnaut, assistant county prosecutor, said there was no evidence that White sold drugs in the prison.

The former pharmacist, Jacklyn E. Cropper, 40, of Canton faces the same charges as White. She has a pretrial hearing July 23 and a trial date of July 30, also in front of Judge Kontos.

Her pharmacy license was suspended in December 2015, and her license remains inactive.

Buccino Arnaut said Cropper is accused of forging two prescriptions – one for Suboxone and one for Oxycontin – and trying to smuggle them into the prison to White. She claimed to have had a personal relationship with White, Buccino Arnaut said.

Cropper was working for pharmacies in the Canton area at the time.