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BANGOR – One of three people charged in the armed robbery of the Hannaford pharmacy in Skowhegan last summer was sentenced Thursday to nearly 13 years in federal prison
Terry Lynn Pelotte, 40, of Fairfield also was sentenced to three years of supervised release in U.S. District Court in Bangor. The fact that Pelotte used a gun in the robbery added a mandatory seven years to his basic sentence of six years for the robbery.
David Sanford, 33, and Erin N. Hunter, 18, both of Clinton also have pleaded guilty to federal charges in connection with the robbery. Both men have long criminal records, according to Assistant U.S. Attorney Nancy Torresen, who prosecuted the case.
The trio forced the pharmacist at the Hannaford pharmacy to open a locked box and give them bottles of OxyContin on July 6, 2003.
According to law enforcement officials, Pelotte entered the grocery store about 5:30 p.m. and approached the pharmacy area. He lifted his shirt, exposed the butt of a handgun that was tucked into his shorts and demanded OxyContin.
The pharmacy clerk told him that she did not have a key to the box where the drugs were kept. Pelotte told her to get one, and she led him to the pharmacist, who was in another location filing documents, according to a court document.
The three returned to the pharmacy, where the pharmacist opened the locked box and gave the robber about 300 pills. Pelotte then fled the store to Hunter’s car, where she and Sanford were waiting.
After his arrest, Pelotte admitted that he had stolen the gun used in the robbery from a blind man and crushed and snorted some of the OxyContin pills shortly after the robbery while still in the getaway car.
U.S. District Court Judge John Woodcock imposed the maximum sentence within the federal sentencing guidelines on Pelotte. He noted that the father of three appeared to have lived a fairly benign life until he turned 25. Since then, noted the judge, Pelotte has appeared in state courts on 17 different occasions.
Pelotte, who has admitted to substance abuse and mental health issues, apologized Thursday to the court and his victims.
“I am very sorry I hurt people,” he said. “What I did was wrong and I’m very sorry for what I did.”
The judge granted Pelotte’s request that he not be confined in the same federal prison where Sanford is incarcerated. He also ordered the Fairfield man to undergo treatment for substance abuse.
Wayne Foote, Pelotte’s Bangor attorney, told the court that Sanford and members of the Hell’s Angels Motorcycle Club had threatened Pelotte while he was awaiting trial.
Sentencing dates for Sanford and Hunter have not been set.
In a different case, two Waterville men were sentenced Wednesday to long terms in federal prison for selling drugs out of their College Avenue apartment.
Donald Andrews, 23, of Waterville and Kevin Brown, 21, of New York, N.Y., were arrested in December 2002 with nearly 10 ounces of crack cocaine in one of the largest seizures of crack cocaine in the state, according to law enforcement officials.
Both men are charged with conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute and with possession with intent to distribute.
Andrews was sentenced to 121/2 years in prison and Brown was sentenced to 11 years in prison. Both men also were sentenced to five years of supervised release, but were not required to pay fines. Each man faced life in prison and-or fines of up to $4 million.
Two men arrested as part of an alleged drug ring based in Waterville and Fairfield have been indicted in the last year. Investigators said the case highlights the problem of more crack cocaine, heroin and other drugs making their way into central and northern Maine up the Interstate 95 corridor.
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