SEQUIM — Would-be thieves sought to break into Frick Drug — the 62-year-old pharmacy a few doors down from the Sequim Police Department — on Sunday morning for the fourth time in as many months.

“The police were here within three minutes,” Frick staff member Kathy Cook said Monday. “But it was still too late.”

A few minutes before 5 a.m., burglars pried Frick’s front door open and sought to enter the pharmacy when the store alarm sounded, Cook added.

Officers respond

Two Sequim Police officers, a Clallam County sheriff’s deputy and Sequim’s K-9 officer, Chase, responded, but the offenders had escaped, said Maris Turner, Sequim Police spokeswoman.

The police station, like Frick’s, is in the J.C. Penney shopping center at 609 W. Washington St.

Nothing was taken on Sunday morning, but during a burglary at Frick’s on Feb. 22, thieves stole methadone, an opioid used as a painkiller and as a substitute drug for heroin addicts, and hydrocodone, another narcotic similar to morphine in its potency.

Frick Drug was the target of break-ins again on March 9 and April 28.

Turner said police are investigating and can’t say whether the same perpetrators are behind the four incidents.

“It’s scary,” said Cook, who added that Frick’s installed surveillance cameras after the first burglary.

Caught on camera

The cameras captured the invaders — two men, Cook said — on Sunday morning and provided still photographs of them to the Sequim police.

Turner is not, however, releasing descriptions of the men or of their clothing.

“We want to keep as much under wraps as possible,” she said.

If a clothing description were released, for example, the burglars might read it and discard those clothes, making the hunt for the men more difficult.

Damage in break-ins

During the repeated attempts to get into the pharmacy, the would-be burglars have damaged the back door, broken a $2,500 pane of glass in the front door and punched a hole in the roof, Cook said.

On March 9, the offenders left a ladder behind, added Turner.

For Cook, coming to work Monday morning after yet another break-in was, of course, distressing.

“It’s such an invasion,” she said.

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Sequim-Dungeness Valley reporter Diane Urbani de la Paz can be reached at 360-681-2391 or at diane.urbani@peninsuladaily news.com.