PORTLAND, Maine — An Old Orchard Beach man was sentenced in U.S. District Court in Portland to nine years in prison for robbing a Rite Aid pharmacy.
Billy Schildroth, 37, also was ordered to undergo three years of supervised release during a hearing Tuesday before Judge Nancy Torresen.
Schildroth pleaded guilty to the federal charge on Aug. 1, U.S. Attorney Thomas E. Delahanty II announced Tuesday in a news release.
According to court records and evidence introduced at the plea hearing, Schildroth’s accomplice, Kyle Desmarais of Biddeford, drove Schildroth to a Rite Aid pharmacy located in Old Orchard Beach on Feb. 13 so that Schildroth could rob the pharmacy.
Schildroth got away with OxyContin and Suboxone after putting his hand inside his coat and telling the pharmacist that he had “a gun and five bullets” and not to alert anyone or he would shoot the pharmacist in the face.
In rendering the sentence, Torresen noted the danger Schildroth’s actions posed to both the pharmacist and the community and Schildroth’s criminal history that included a residential burglary and two drug trafficking convictions.
Desmarais was sentenced on Oct. 8 to 2½ years in prison for aiding and abetting pharmacy robbery.
The investigation that led to the convictions was conducted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Old Orchard Beach Police Department.