Man held in O.C. pharmacy heists
A man suspected of stealing tens of thousands of dollars in pain-relief pills from Orange County pharmacies was arrested Thursday as he entered a Huntington Beach pharmacy.
The arrest of Brian Dow Fleming, 38, came just hours after a fast-working bandit -- suspected to be him -- cut a hole in the roof a San Clemente pharmacy shortly before midnight Wednesday, escaping with a large stash of drugs in less time than the four minutes it took sheriff’s deputies to respond to the building’s alarm.
It was the second time in the last month that the Medicine Shoppe Pharmacy in the 1000 block of South El Camino Real had been hit by a thief who dropped through its ceiling to steal morphine-derivative drugs and other pills.
“It’s very frustrating,” Orange County sheriff’s spokesman Jim Amormino said. “We must have missed him by just seconds.”
The thief escaped with large quantities of Valium, Vicodin and Xanax. Last month, large jars of OxyContin -- a synthetic narcotic prescribed for pain -- Valium and Vicodin were stolen, Amormino said.
Fleming was named as a suspect after a Lake Forest pharmacy burglary Feb. 11 in which an estimated $10,500 worth of morphine-derivative drugs were stolen. A $50,000 warrant was issued for his arrest.
A task force of federal marshals, state parole agents and sheriff’s deputies tracked him Thursday to a residence in Fountain Valley, then to a Walgreens Pharmacy in Huntington Beach, where he was arrested without incident, authorities said.
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