CHELSEA — A Bethel man who faced a felony manslaughter charge for allegedly not responding quickly enough to aid a friend who died from a drug overdose after collapsing in his apartment pleaded no contest to a reduced misdemeanor count of reckless endangerment and received a fully suspended jail sentence in Orange County court.

Jody White, formerly of Gage Road in Bethel, was sentenced to three to six months in jail, all suspended, and placed on one-year probation, stemming from the overdose death of Crystal Porter, of Royalton, in February 2023.

But White’s time on the street could be short lived. He is scheduled to return to court this week after not abiding by the court-ordered terms in a subsequent criminal matter in another county.

White, 55, had initially been charged with involuntary manslaughter after a police investigation alleged that he failed to provide aid for more than an hour to Porter, 45, after he found her collapsed in his bathroom from a drug overdose.

White had called 911 shortly before midnight on Feb. 6, 2023, to report that Porter was unresponsive in the front seat of his truck after he had pulled over in an attempt to “resuscitate” her on Route 14 at the intersection with Kingsbury Road in Bethel, according to Vermont State Police.

Ambulance personnel arrived and tried reviving Porter, but were unsuccessful. She was pronounced deceased at the scene.

Police alleged that Porter had in fact been unresponsive for a longer period of time than White had initially reported, and that he waited more than an hour until after he had assisted her in a semi-conscious state into his truck. White had maintained that Porter “keeled” over into the truck’s center console en route to the hospital.

White told police that he didn’t immediately call 911 when he found Porter collapsed in his bathroom because, “I didn’t want my landlord to freak and kick me out,” the affidavit said.

White lived in an apartment over the garage on the same property as his landlord.

(White’s landlord subsequently served him with an eviction notice for past due rent in June 2023 — four months after Porter’s death, but four months before White was charged with manslaughter. State police attributed the eight months that passed between Porter’s death and White’s arrest due to a “complex investigation”).

White sought to have the manslaughter charge dismissed with his attorney arguing in a motion that there was “(in)sufficient evidence to establish” that White had either “caused” or “acted in criminal disregard” in Porter’s overdose death. White’s attorney also cited state case law that he argued says a person does “not have a legal duty to call 911 … to aid a person who is in danger.”

Vermont prosecutors filed a counter motion opposing White’s dismissal motion, asserting that White’s alleged behavior and response to Porter’s overdose clearly rose to the level of “criminal negligence.”

The state subsequently dropped the felony manslaughter count and filed an amended charge of reckless endangerment, a misdemeanor offense, on Feb. 25. White entered a no contest plea the next day.

But, despite the reduced charge and fully suspended jail sentence, White has more legal trouble ahead.

In July, he was charged in Lamoille County with four misdemeanor counts of passing bad checks, according to court records.

White told police the bounced checks, totaling $4,058, were written by a friend to whom he gave signed blank checks for “financial help,” according to the police affidavit. White said the friend told him she was going to deposit money into his account to cover the amount she was going to write in payment on the blank checks.

In fact, investigators found, White’s bank account balance was $7.09 at the time.

White was accepted into a court ordered division program on the misdemeanor bad checks charge. but failed to complete the program, according to court records.

He has now been summoned back to Lamoille County court to appear for arraignment on Wednesday.

Contact John Lippman at jlippman@vnews.com.