Former Bucks County Sheriff Deputy Arrested For Taking Naked Photos Of Prisoners
by Alex Lloyd Gross
Bucks County District Attorney Joe Khan announced charges against Ryan Gaffney, a former Deputy Sheriff since 2023.
A summons was filed against him alleging that on two occasions, in 2024 and again in 2026, while employed as a sheriff, he came in contact with males that were naked while serving a warrant. He is alleged to have taken photos of those males and disseminating them to fiends and people that had no business seeing them. According to Khan, one image showed a handcuffed , naked male on a bed. He was using his own personal cell phone and covered up his body camera, Khan said.
Gaffney is accused over lying about the incident when questioned about it. Information came to light, when a colleague found out and turned him in. Gallagher tried to deny the allegations when questioned by authorities, , Khan said.
He is charged with obstruction of Justice, official oppression. and related offenses. Khan said one of the incidents happened in December of 2024. Khan said that he is not aware of who knew about the incident back then.
Gaffney was a former officer in Hulmeville Boro, Penndel Borough and also patrolled Lower Moreland Township. Since he was charged by a summons, there is no booking photo. Khan called it a breach of public trust and said “We don’t treat people that way”
According to the affidavit of probable cause, on January 30, 2026, Gaffney and four other uniformed deputies executed an arrest warrant for an adult male at his residence in Middletown Township. The male was suffering from a mental health crisis and was located upstairs in a bedroom, naked from the waist down.
While the male sat on a bench at the end of his bed attempting to put on pants, Gaffney covered his own body-worn camera with his hand to obstruct the recording. However, the body camera of another deputy in the room captured footage of Gaffney removing his right glove, pulling out his personal cellphone, opening the camera application, and pointing the camera lens directly at the male. Later that day at the Bucks County Criminal Justice Center, Gaffney showed the photograph of the male’s genitalia to female civilian employees “in jest,” according to the criminal complaint. Forensic analysis later revealed he also texted the image to two personal contacts.
During a voluntary administrative interview on April 6, 2026 with Sheriff Daniel Ceisler and investigators, Gaffney made false and misleading statements verbally before signing a written statement, all falsely denying that he used his personal cell phone to create and distribute the January 30 image, the criminal complaint says.