Breaking into the probation office, eh?

Courtesy of

MANCHESTER, N.H. - Two men have been accused of breaking into a probation and parole office in an apparent attempt to retrieve drug-tainted urine samples.

Peter O'Neill, 33, who was on parole at the time of the Jan. 4 break-in, is accused of giving a friend dark clothes, a mask and tools and sending him off to burglarize the Manchester Office of Probation and Parole.

When the friend, Michael Neuner, 19, was unsuccessful, O'Neill returned with him to finish the job, court records show.

People on parole or probation routinely provide urine samples to prove they are not using alcohol or drugs. The samples are stored in freezers at parole offices until being sent to the State Police Laboratory for testing, said Jeff Lyons, spokesman for the Department of Corrections.

"I think they had an idea of whose samples were in there," Lyons said.

The burglars destroyed the keypad entry system on the building's front door, used a crowbar to try to pry it open and smashed a window to get in. More than a dozen samples were stolen.

O'Neill was arrested soon after. When he was searched, police found a letter written by Neuner to his sister in which he confessed to burglarizing the office, according to court records.

Neuner later told police he didn't want to burglarize the office but did it because he was afraid of O'Neill. He said O'Neill told him to smash the office's computers to make it look like juveniles broke in