A trail of pill bottles stolen from a Florida pharmacy led detectives to a home where they found two men who matched descriptions of the robbers seen on surveillance video.
According to officials with the Pinellas County Sheriff’s Office, the duo and an accomplice robbed a CVS in Clearwater at around 5 a.m. on New Year’s Day at gunpoint. They also bound the employees with zip ties.
The robbers got away with more than 10,000 pills containing the opioids hydrocodone and oxycodone, the Tampa Bay Times reports. Those drugs had a street value of about $320,000.
However, the men left behind some important clues.
The surveillance video captured them fleeing in a white Chrysler 200. They also emptied pills from bottles, which they threw from the car’s window, creating a trail which guided detectives to the home.
Investigators believe the trio planned the robbery, going as far as to stake out the location out the day before, according to The Times. Detectives noticed one of the robbers casing the store in the surveillance video they reviewed.
The two men, 19-year-old Christopher Rachell Jr. and 19-year-old David Dobbins, were arrested later New Year’s Day.
Dobbins’ cellphone contained video of the men in a room with a bed that was piled with pills and clear plastic bags, reports add. Other videos show them handling a white garbage bag, which is the same kind seen in the pharmacy’s surveillance video.
The videos also helped investigators to identify the accomplice, 18-year-old Roy Lampkin, who can be seen handling the white bag. Detectives also found his fingerprints at the scene.
Lampkin was seen on video entering the CVS at 3:52 a.m. on Jan. 1, apparently asking the pharmacist a question. Authorities caught up to him on Feb. 5 and charged him with drug trafficking.
All three men are still in jail.
Rachell and Dobbins are each charged with two counts of trafficking in illegal drugs, three counts of false imprisonment and one count of armed robbery.
Dobbins is being held in lieu of $280,000 bond. Rachell is also charged with oxycodone possession and is being held in lieu of $282,000 bond, while Lampkin is charged with two drug trafficking charges and remains behind bars on a $1 million bond.