The plan was simple: Go into a Walgreens convenience store with a pistol in his pocket, point it at someone’s face, then come out moments later with prescription drugs.
Damien Huff had done this many times before.
It worked each time.
Adapting a somewhat similar approach with armored truck guard Scott Bee at a bank would be a deadly one.
Huff showed little reaction as Circuit Court Judge David Swanson sentenced to him on June 13 to spend the rest of his life behind bars for his role in a string of robberies two years ago that ended with Bee’s shooting death.
“You took a life. You took my dad, my best friend,” Bee’s oldest daughter, Apryl Kitchen, said through tears. “My father deserves so much more than what he was dealt.”
A jury convicted Huff, 30, in April of first-degree intentional homicide in the July 13, 2023, slaying of Bee, a 55-year-old security guard from Waukesha.
Jurors also found him guilty of other felony charges, including armed robbery as a party to a crime.
Here’s how the robberies unfolded
Prosecutors said Huff and another man, Colby Logan, robbed five Walgreens pharmacies of prescription medication in Milwaukee and Wauwatosa in June and July 2023.
In each instance, a masked man with sunglasses and a handgun demanded Oxycodone pills and fled with the help of a getaway driver. Different vehicles were used in each caper.
In one instance, the suspects made off with more than 4,000 pills.
What happened to Scott Bee?
On July 13, 2023 – just three days after the fifth Walgreens robbery – the suspects set their sights on hitting an armored truck.
That day, three security guards inside an armored vehicle pulled up near an ATM outside a northwest side bank. They were there to refill the machine with cash.
A black Mazda that was connected to at least one of the Walgreens robberies showed up nearby and a man got out from it. That man then approached Bee while pointing a handgun at him.
Bee was kneeling at the ATM when he heard someone say “give me the money,” he later told first responders. The man then opened fire.
Bee was hit three times. Two of the shots were fired into his back while he lay on the ground.
Bee was able to return fire but did not hit the attacker. He died 12 days later, leaving behind a wife, six children and two grandchildren.
It was later determined the man made off with nearly $70,000. Another $95,000 had been dropped as the suspect fled, and was recovered by police.
“He (Huff) thought the money he was going to get from the ATM machine and the other robberies … were worth more than Scott Bee’s life,” Assistant District Attorney Grant Huebner said.
Prosecutor: Damien Huff ‘didn’t learn lesson’ from previous incarceration
Huebner pleaded with Swanson to give Huff life, noting his “disturbing” criminal history. He was first charged with a crime as a juvenile in 2007; police said he brought “a dangerous weapon to school.”
Huff was 12 at the time.
At 13, he was charged with armed robbery and spent a year in juvenile custody. Other arrests in Sheboygan and Milwaukee counties followed for disorderly conduct and other crimes.
It was May 2014 when Damien Huff walked into a Milwaukee Dollar Tree and placed one item on the conveyor belt.
No one can recall if it was a candy bar or a bag of chips, but the cashier, according to a criminal complaint, remembered clearly the $1.06 he had in his hand.
When the clerk opened the register, the customer pulled out a pistol.
“Give me everything you’ve got. Put it in the bag,” the robber demanded, according to a June 14, 2014, criminal complaint.
The robber got away with $230.40, but was eventually caught. It was Huff, who was later convicted and sentenced to eight years in prison.
He was 18 at the time.
The Walgreens crime spree started not long after his release in 2022.
Huebner said Huff used the same strategy to rob the Walgreens stores. Prosecutors believe he stole prescription drugs, so he could resell them on the street.
“He didn’t learn his lesson in prison,” Huebner said.
Robberies in Milwaukee remain a big concern in the first six months of 2025
According to Milwaukee police data, 1,965 robberies were reported in 2024, up from 1,932 in 2023, the year Bee was shot and killed.
There have been 661 robberies reported in 2025 as of June 12, compared with 818 at the same point last year, the data shows.
Logan, 33, of Milwaukee, pleaded guilty in November to felony murder as a party to a crime and two counts of armed robbery as a party to a crime. He was sentenced to a 25-year prison term.
Bee’s widow, Carmen Bee, told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that while she was pleased with the court’s decision, no amount of prison time for Huff would make up for the loss of her husband.
“He (Huff) deprived me of the man I wanted to grow old with,” she said. “What he took from me, from family, will never be replaced – a man I truly love. And it hurts.
“At least now, he can’t destroy another family … or hurt anymore people.”
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Milwaukee man gets life for killing armored truck guard in 2023 Walgreens robbery spree
Reporting by Chris Ramirez, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
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