Pharmacy employee sentenced for fraud and theft of prescription drugs

A 40-year-old man has been sentenced to one year in prison, partly suspended, for extensive computer fraud and theft of prescription medication.

The District Court in Roskilde found the Copenhagen man guilty of stealing medication from a pharmacy where he was employed.

The man worked at a pharmacy in Roskilde and was charged with unlawfully obtaining more than 11,400 prescription pills over a nine-month period in 2021, including Tramadol and benzodiazepines, with the intention of selling the pills.

He was also charged with stealing medication and cash worth more than DKK 200,000 from another pharmacy in Copenhagen in 2024. When he was arrested, he was in possession of more than 2,000 pills.

Some of the medication was obtained by misusing prescription subsidies belonging to terminally ill patients. The man used patients’ personal information to purchase medication. In some cases, he subsequently returned the purchases and transferred the prescription subsidies to his own account.

Prosecutors argued that the case should fall under the Danish Criminal Code’s provision on narcotics, but the court did not agree. Instead, the man was convicted under regulations governing controlled substances and doping substances.

He was sentenced to one year in prison, three months of which are to be served, while the remainder of the sentence was suspended.

The court took into account, among other things, that the man admitted obtaining the substances and had no previous convictions.

He denied selling the medication, telling the court that he had either used it himself or given it to family members.

Prosecutors had also sought to have the man banned from working in the pharmacy sector again, but the court did not grant the request.

Following the verdict, the man asked for time to consider whether to appeal.

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