A 33-year-old Washington, D.C. man has been sentenced to 80 months in federal prison for his role in a burglary ring that broke into 20 pharmacies across Maryland, Pennsylvania, and Virginia, stealing prescription opioids, stimulants, and other controlled substances meant for illegal street distribution. Deontae Britton, who also went by the alias Deaundre Blount, carried out the burglaries alongside two co-conspirators between January and April 2022, with several of the break-ins concentrated in Baltimore and Howard counties.
According to CBS News, Britton worked with 40-year-old Harold Dorman of Chillum, Maryland, and 58-year-old William Sherod III of Fort Washington, Maryland, to target pharmacies after business hours. Two masked men dressed in dark clothing would force their way inside while Sherod acted as a lookout, parking a separate vehicle nearby to watch for responding police.
The crew moved fast. One burglar wielded a blue pry bar while another carried a large silver Halligan bar — the same kind of claw-bladed forcible-entry tool firefighters use to breach doors during emergencies — to tear through doors, frames, and locks. Per the same CBS Baltimore account, the burglars were in and out of each pharmacy in under two minutes, searching specifically for controlled substances before fleeing.
What the Crew Was After
Investigators said the stolen medications were intended for illegal distribution, not personal use. The burglars made off with oxycodone, promethazine-codeine syrup, hydrocodone-acetaminophen, Adderall, Suboxone, and fentanyl patches — all drugs that command high value on illicit markets, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. The pattern of targeted, high-value pharmaceutical theft fits into a larger national problem: the Drug Enforcement Administration has reported that nearly 900 pharmacy burglaries involving stolen controlled substances were logged nationwide in 2023 alone.
The break-ins weren't isolated incidents. Before the three men were finally arrested, police had already linked the crew to earlier February 2022 burglaries on Maryland's Eastern Shore, including forced entries at Karemore Pharmacy on Snow Hill Road and at Milford Street Pharmacy in Salisbury, according to a document posted by the Salisbury Police Department. That same record describes how covert surveillance finally caught Britton and Dorman entering Delmarva Pharmacy in Salisbury through a rear door on April 12, 2022 — triggering a swarm response from the Howard County Police Department, Maryland State Police, and Salisbury Police that ended with all three men arrested on the spot.
A Tri-State Investigation and Federal Charges
Because the burglaries crossed state lines and involved stolen controlled substances, the case fell under federal jurisdiction. Under the Controlled Substance Registrant Protection Act of 1984, pharmacy burglaries become federal matters once the replacement cost of stolen drugs exceeds $500 or suspects cross state lines to commit the crime — a statute specifically written to protect DEA-registered pharmacies from organized theft rings. The resulting investigation pulled together the FDA's Office of Criminal Investigations, the FBI's Baltimore Field Office, the DEA's Washington Division, and multiple state and county police departments across Maryland, per the Justice Department.
U.S. District Judge Stephanie Gallagher handed down Britton's sentence, adding three years of supervised release on top of the 80-month prison term for his role in the conspiracy. Sherod received a separate 40-month federal prison sentence for acting as the group's lookout. Federal court records cited by CBS News indicate that charges against Dorman remain pending as of this month, with no resolution yet reported in his case.
A Pattern Beyond Maryland
Britton's record of organized theft didn't end with the Eastern Shore burglaries. In June 2023, federal prosecutors in Washington, D.C. indicted him under his alias, Deaundre Blount, alongside six co-defendants on Hobbs Act robbery charges tied to a separate, armed robbery crew accused of hitting 18 pharmacies and cell phone stores across D.C., Maryland, Virginia, and New Jersey between May 2020 and May 2021, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Columbia. Hobbs Act robbery charges can carry up to 20 years in federal prison per count, underscoring how the Maryland pharmacy case fits into a broader pattern of organized commercial theft networks operating across the Mid-Atlantic region.
