Oxycontin News Blog

They wore yellow hard hats, their faces covered with dust masks, as they pulled off a string of daring daytime holdups in Jersey City. The crew netted $30,000 to $50,000 per heist - but they weren't ripping off banks.

"These guys were looking for, in particular, OxyContin and Percocet," said Jersey City police Lt. Michael Kelly. "They are both very valuable on the street and can go anywhere from $40 to $80 per tablet. Their take was as much as 2,000 to 3,000 tablets [per robbery], so the street value was big money."

Drugstore crimes are becoming more prevalent, said Aaron Graham, chief security officer at Purdue Pharma of Stamford, Conn., which makes OxyContin.

With heightened post-9/11 security at border crossings and airports, it has become harder to smuggle in street drugs that are grown overseas, such as cocaine and heroin. Pharmaceuticals, meanwhile, are monitored by the federal government, virtually guaranteeing their quality.

"Historically, many people rob banks to get money to buy drugs," said Graham, a former DEA agent. "They have now learned that they can get pretty good drugs at the pharmacy, and that they are soft targets, with no cops, no guns, and, in many cases, no cameras."

To help combat the trend, Purdue Pharma has developed a program called RxPATROL Crime Stoppers. Run by Graham, the program works with local police in communities across the country to investigate pharmacy robberies, offering tipsters $1,000 rewards for information that leads to arrests.

It was a tip from an RxPATROL informant that led to the arrests of James Battle, 35, of Jersey City, Michael "Ahk" Adams, 47, of Newark, and Kevin "Mugsey" Scott, 48, of East Orange, three of the suspects in the Jersey City "hard hat" drugstore robberies.

"With these five armed robberies, we didn't have a lot of evidence, but through the help of the media and RxPATROL we were able to identify tips that helped us solve the case," Kelly said.

Even the smallest of rewards pay huge dividends, said Stamford police Capt. Richard Conklin, a consultant who manages the RxPATROL program.

"There's really very little honor among criminals," Conklin said. "If they can stand to make $1,000 and they know who that person is, they will [turn them in]. And a lot of these people do know because they run in these criminal circles, and they call up right away with the information."

RxPATROL has benefited from its partnership with Crime Stoppers, which gets the word out through advertisements in newspapers and on television. The tip service is anonymous.

"People who frequent criminal circles don't want their name out that they've helped law enforcement," Conklin said. "It's all behind the scenes and confidential and it works very well."

"No one has ever given up a name," said Tami Lawlor, Crime Stoppers' RxPATROL liaison. "It's something that we've never broken in the history of Crime Stoppers."

RxPATROL also maintains a database of information on pharmacy crimes nationwide, which can be used by local authorities to help make arrests.

"Local police have a hard time communicating across city and state lines about pharmacy robberies," Kelly said. "In many instances some police officer or informant from another area knows who the bad guy is. But because they're not talking to each other, we never find the guy. So we created an information clearinghouse."

Graham said RxPATROL, which began in May 2003 and started offering rewards for tips last spring, has led to a dozen or so arrests.

RxPATROL also advises pharmacies on purchasing proper security equipment to keep the thieves out in the first place. Conklin recommends security cameras, motion detectors and alarms with a battery or cellphone backup.

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