Staff report

GAINESVILLE, Fla. – Jaquil Chamara Williams, 29, has been charged with two armed robberies in February 2023, a Walgreens on February 4 in Keystone Heights and a CVS on February 13 in High Springs. Williams has been in the Alachua County Jail for nearly a year after being arrested on March 7, 2023, and charged with the February 20, 2023 armed robbery of the Walgreens on NW 43rd Street. In each incident, the suspect entered the restricted employee area of the pharmacy and demanded Oxycodone, Promethazine, and other medications while claiming to have a gun.

The High Springs robbery was one of a string of pharmacy robberies in Alachua and Clay Counties between November 18, 2022, and February 27, 2023, and a Clay County Sheriff’s Detective filed an affidavit on February 29, 2024, laying out the evidence against Williams.

After Williams was arrested last March, Gainesville Police Department obtained a search warrant for his phone, and the location information on the device reportedly placed Williams at the Keystone Heights pharmacy on February 4 and at the High Springs pharmacy on February 13, along with the Gainesville Walgreens on February 20. Numerous text messages reportedly referred to slang terminology for narcotics, and some text messages discussed plans to commit some of the robberies.

A white Hyundai Elantra or similar small white sedan was seen by witnesses in Keystone Heights and Gainesville, and the sedan seen in High Springs was described as gray in color; Williams allegedly fled from a vehicle matching that description on the night he was arrested.

The arrest report notes that no similar pharmacy robberies have been reported since Williams was arrested last March.

Williams has been charged with two counts of unarmed robbery, on top of the previously-filed charge of robbery connected with an organized criminal enterprise. He has five felony convictions (one violent) and seven misdemeanor convictions (two violent) and has served one state prison sentence, with release in May 2022.

Judge Luis Bustamante recommended bail of $1,000,000 on Williams’ arrest warrant, but the State Attorney’s Office filed notice of intent to request pre-trial detention without bail, and Judge Susan Miller-Jones ordered Williams held without bail until the motion is heard. Williams was already being held on $500,000 bail on the previous case.

Articles about arrests are based on reports from law enforcement agencies. The charges listed are taken from the arrest report and/or court records and are only accusations. All suspects are innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.