Man sentenced in drugstore robbery

BELFAST – The man who admitted holding up the Unity Pharmacy using a gun and a knife will spend the next 10 years in prison and could be looking at more jail time for two other drugstore robberies.

Shawn D. Kivlin, 29, of Unity pleaded guilty to the Jan. 21 robbery earlier this month.

On Thursday, Kivlin stood mute before Superior Court Justice Nancy Mills as she handed down a 20-year sentence with all but 10 years suspended and four years of probation on the armed robbery charge.

Kivlin received two concurrent five-year prison terms for criminal threatening with a dangerous weapon and eluding an officer, charges that stemmed from the case.

Kivlin’s problems with the law are not over, however. He remains under indictment for the Nov. 21, 2004, armed robbery of the Fairfield Pharmacy and the Dec. 21, 2004, armed robbery of the Pittsfield Pharmacy. Those cases are pending, with plea bargain discussions in both.

In all three robberies, a masked man brandishing a gun and a knife entered the stores and demanded prescription drugs. He was able to get away with drugs from the Fairfield and Pittsfield robberies, but was foiled in Unity when the pharmacist handed him pill bottles filled with M&M candies instead of narcotics.

The pharmacist told police he was aware of the earlier armed robberies and had set the bottles of candy aside in case his store were targeted by the robber.

The Unity druggist followed the robber after he left the store and alerted police to his movements by cell phone. Because the other Fairfield and Pittsfield robberies took place on the 21st of the month, extra police were assigned to the central Maine area that day because of the pattern established by the earlier holdups.

As a result, Waldo County sheriff’s deputies and state troopers were able to converge as the robber drove off. He was followed through Unity, Montville and Searsmont before being apprehended without incident.

Kivlin was arrested in the Knox County town of Appleton after a pursuit that lasted about a half-hour. His car was stopped after the tires were flattened when the vehicle passed over a spike mat placed on the highway by a state trooper. A gun, knife and pill bottles were recovered from the car.