St. Charles Man Sentenced for Heroin Distribution that Killed Local Man

St. Louis, MO – David Bollinger, was sentenced to 130 months imprisonment today on charges of knowingly and intentionally distributing heroin to Mitchell Stenger.

According to testimony presented at sentencing, Stenger contacted Bollinger on December 3, 2014, and asked Bollinger to provide him with heroin. After initially declining, Bollinger made the 60-mile round-trip from his home in Cottleville to a source of supply in the City of St. Louis, where he acquired heroin. Bollinger then delivered that heroin to Stenger, despite knowing that Stenger was suffering from significant asthma-related breathing difficulties and was receiving regular injections of Vivitrol. Dr. Stacey Hail, an Emergency Department physician at Parkland Hospital in Dallas, Texas, testified that Vivitrol is a prescription medication used in the treatment of heroin addiction. The medication is administered by injection, given once monthly and blocks heroin’s effects on the user’s brain. As a result, Hail testified, users who attempt to overcome the blockade use increasingly large amounts of heroin in order to get high, leaving them especially vulnerable to overdose. Shortly after Stenger’s death, Bollinger admitted to police that he knew that Stenger was using dangerous amounts of heroin in an attempt to counteract the Vivitrol, and reported that his last words to Stenger were “dude, be careful.”

Bollinger pled guilty in July 2016 to one felony count of distribution of heroin.  He appeared today for sentencing before United States District Judge Carol E. Jackson. In her remarks, Judge Jackson noted that Stenger would not have died "but for" the ingestion of the heroin distributed by Bollinger, and that the offense required a significant punishment.

This case was investigated by the Cottleville Police Department, the St. Charles County Regional Drug Task Force and the Drug Enforcement Administration.