BUCKSPORT, Maine — A man suspected of robbing a local pharmacy Sunday has been arrested after officers located him Monday afternoon, according to police.
Phillip C. Russell, 44, was found in Orland and arrested without incident, Bucksport police Chief Sean Geaghan said Tuesday morning.
In a prepared statement released around noon Tuesday, Bucksport police Sgt. David Winchester said Russell was tracked down at the end of a day-long manhunt near Craig Pond. He was arrested on a Class B felony charge of robbery, which with a conviction carries a possible sentence of up to 10 years in prison and a fine of $20,000.
Law enforcement officers with the Hancock County Sheriff’s Department, Maine State Police, Maine Drug Enforcement Agency and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service assisted in the arrest.
Russell is accused of entering the local Rite Aid pharmacy shortly after noon Sunday and demanding a prescription drug from the pharmacist, according to Bucksport police. He was given the drug, then immediately left the scene in a white GMC pickup truck, traveling east on Route 1, police indicated Monday.
No weapon was displayed during the robbery, police have said, but they have not indicated whether it was an armed robbery. The type and amount of prescription drug Russell allegedly took has not been disclosed.
According to Stephen McCausland, spokesman for the Maine Department of Public Safety, pharmacy robberies have been down during the past two years, after a record high of 56 in 2012. There were only 13 in 2013. However, with the robbery in Bucksport on Sunday, there have been 20 so far this year.
There have been developments this month in other pharmacy robberies that have occurred in the past few years in Hancock County.
On Dec. 4, two men were indicted on charges of robbery and stealing drugs in connection with a March 31 pharmacy robbery at Shaw’s Supermarket.
On Dec. 8, an Otis man was arrested on charges of robbery and stealing drugs more than two years after he allegedly robbed Walgreens Pharmacy in Ellsworth of prescription drugs.
