Revere man indicted for forged drug prescription

SALEM – A Revere man accused of forging a prescription at a CVS Store in Beverly in August has been indicted by an Essex County grand jury.Edward Michael DeStasio, 65, of 114 Reservoir Ave., is facing a charge of uttering a false prescription, a subsequent offense.The charge arises out of an incident on Aug. 18 when the accused walked into the CVS on Dodge Street in Beverly and presented a bad prescription for Percocet.The pharmacist called authorities after he became suspicious because DeStasio had been in the store before with other prescriptions for the same elderly woman.When police confronted DeStasio, who was still waiting for the prescription to be filled, he reportedly told them he had gotten the phony prescription from a man he had met in a bar.DeStasio has prior convictions for similar offenses in 2008, according to court records.The indictment handed down now moves the case from Salem District Court, where DeStasio has pleaded not guilty, to Salem Superior Court, where he will be re-arraigned within a few weeks.In the meantime, DeStasio remains free on $500 cash bail.Assistant District Attorney Michael Patten is prosecuting the case for the commonwealth.An indictment is not an indication of guilt: rather it is a legal process that allows a case to be transferred from District Court to Superior Court, allowing for a more severe punishment.