KEY POINTS:
An armed man who robbed a Wellington pharmacy made off with only $30 worth of morphine tablets, police say.
The "agitated offender" ignored methadone and cash in favour of the morphine, when he robbed the Medical Centre Pharmacy in the suburb of Johnsonville about 12.20pm on Saturday, Acting Detective Sergeant Andrew Compton said.
The pharmacy staff were surprised when the strawberry blond or ginger haired robber burst in through the Trafalgar Street side door entrance, just as the pharmacy was about to close, he said.
Mr Compton said the man was quite violent in his threats to pharmacy staff and threatened them with a large knife.
He was quite insistent that he wanted the morphine and not methadone or cash.
"His actions appeared to be that of someone desperate to get their next drug fix."
He was given a small quantity of morphine based tablets valued at $30 and fled back out through the Trafalgar Street door.
He was believed to have left the area in a black 4WD vehicle - make and model unknown but it had an uncovered spare wheel mounted on the back door of the vehicle.
"There were quite a few people in the Countdown and Mobil Service Station part of the shopping centre who may seen the black 4WD driving erratically away from the scene," Mr Compton said.
"We're really interested to talk with these people, pedestrians who may have had to quickly get out of the way and from others who saw something suspicious."
The man was described as a European aged 25 to 35-years-old, was about 175cm tall and of average build. He was wearing camouflage style pants and a black hooded sweat shirt.
- NZPA
