The third and final person charged in connection with the September holdups of a pair of Augusta pharmacies pleaded guilty Tuesday to robbery in U.S. District Court in Bangor.
Lance M. Szady, 26, of Augusta, who police said drove the car during the Sept. 2 robberies of Rite Aids on North Belfast Avenue and Hospital Street, faces up to 20 years in prison, $250,000 in fines and three years of supervised release.
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Szady’s plea came a day after 21-year-old Nicole Breton, of Chelsea, pleaded guilty to a federal charge of being an accessory after the fact in connection with the robberies.
Dominic J. Pomerleau, 21, of Augusta, last month pleaded guilty in the same court to the federal equivalent of robbery and attempted robbery. He awaits sentencing and, like Szady, faces up to 20 years in prison, a $250,000 fine and three years of supervised release on each charge.
Szady already has served a sentence in state prison for robbing an Augusta pharmacy in June 2010 and for multiple storage unit burglaries. Both he and Pomerleau, who was convicted in January 2012 of eluding an officer and sentenced to four years of incarceration with all but nine months suspended and two years of probation, were on probation at the time of the September robbery.
Pomerleau entered the Hospital Street Rite Aid and approached the pharmacy counter with a note that demanded oxycodone, Assistant U.S. Attorney Todd Lowell said in a news release. Pomerleau ran off with three bottles of oxycodone.
Szady drove Pomerleau to the pharmacy. Szady and Breton waited for Pomerleau in the car during the robbery. Lowell said Breton “emptied the pills from the bottles and threw the empty bottles and caps out of the car window.”
Szady then drove Pomerleau and Breton to Breton’s Chelsea home, where the trio spent the night consuming many of the pills that were taken in the robbery.
Szady allegedly told investigators from the Augusta Police Department and the FBI that he had driven Pomerleau to the two Rite Aids.
Both Szady and Breton told investigators that they and Pomerleau had been swimming at Breton’s aunt’s house in Augusta and left in Szady’s car, stopping first at McDonald’s on Bangor Street, where she got paper and a pen. Pomerleau then wrote on it, she said.
The first robbery occurred at 5:30 p.m. at the Rite Aid on North Belfast Avenue, where Pomerleau handed the pharmacist a note that read: “I have a gun. Don’t push the button or I’ll shoot,” according to an affidavit filed by FBI Special Agent Cameron Mizell.
The robber demanded the painkiller oxycodone and Ritalin, which is a brand name for methylphenidate, a stimulant used to treat attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder.
The affidavit did not say whether Pomerleau actually had a gun.
Mizell wrote that the phone rang as the pharmacist was getting the pills, at which point the robber ran out of the store before getting the pills.
About 20 minutes after the first robbery, a man in a different color T-shirt robbed the Rite Aid on Hospital Street.
The man again approached the pharmacy counter with a note that said he had a gun and demanded oxycodone, Mizell wrote.
The robber was given pills and fled the store. Witnesses’ descriptions of the robber, including distinctive tattoos, matched those provided after the first robbery, Mizell wrote.
In January 2011, Szady pleaded guilty in Kennebec County Superior Court to 53 charges, including a 2010 CVS pharmacy robbery and a dozen break-ins at self-storage units, and was sentenced to 10 years in prison with all but 3½ years suspended and three years of probation — a sentence recommended by both the state and the defense attorney.
Szady’s attorney at the time, Lisa Whittier, told the court he had a severe substance abuse problem and was hoping to get into treatment while in prison.
According to state records, Szady was released from the Maine State Prison on July 19, 2013, and began his probation.
Documents filed in state court in connection with Szady’s earlier robbery case indicate he spent most of the time from age 15 to age 18 at Mountain View Youth Development Center in Charleston and was occasionally hospitalized in the psychiatric unit at Acadia Hospital in Bangor.
Craig Crosby — 621-5642
Twitter: @CraigCrosby4
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