pharmacy

UPDATE: Augusta police have taken Ryan McLaughlin, 26 of Dreseden, into custody and is being held on federal charges related to the robberies of a pharmacy at an Augusta Shaw's on Monday (Nov. 11) and Tuesday (Nov. 12.)

There's been yet another pharmacy robbery in Augusta. Augusta Police say the CVS Pharmacy on Stone Street was robbed Tuesday (Jan. 22) around 4pm.

Hey this was MY idea... GPS chips in certain drug bottles. Well, the New York Police Department wants pharmacies in and around NYC to fight prescription drug thefts by stocking pill bottles fitted with GPS tracking chips. With so many pharmacy robberies in Maine last year, we can see where this is a good idea.

There was another pharmacy robbery Maine. This time in Sanford. However, there was a quick end to the story. The police got the guy about ten minutes after it happened.

Some numbers for crime and deaths for 2012 were down, but some were up. Maine had 22 homicides in 2012, slightly below the 10-year average. The state saw 19 fire deaths, down from 23 in 2011. The number of highway deaths for the year stands at 164, up from 136 in 2011 but still below the 10-year average. However, pharmacy robberies were a big issue.

Rite-Aid in Bangor is going to be adding security guards to try and stop the wave of pharmacy robberies happening.  While Augusta is the community with the most pharmacies for the year (so far), 4 of the 54 pharmacy robberies in Maine this year have been at the same Bangor Rite Aid.

Well, the number of pharmacy robberies in now at 53 for the Pine Tree State. The CVS pharmacy on Capital Street in Augusta was robbed of drugs for the second time this month and for the third time this year. It’s the second time in three days an Augusta drug store had been hit.

I cheered when I heard an employee at Rite Aid in Pittsfield, during the store's third robbery in the last eleven months, told the would-be thief, who claimed to have a gun (but never showed it), "you aren't getting pills."