Tara Macher says she still goes to the same Cranberry Township pharmacy that her husband tried to rob with a gizmo he’d fashioned to look like a pipe bomb.

She said employees at that Rite Aid urged her not to switch stores because they told her “he (Matthew Jeffrey Macher) seemed more scared than they did.”

Tara Macher told this to Butler County Judge William Shaffer on Monday, before his decision on sentencing Macher, who pleaded guilty to attempted robbery.

The judge decided Macher, 35, will spend 18 to 36 months in state prison and a year of probation. He already has credit for 169 days he spent in the county prison waiting a resolution in his case.

Macher asked for a shorter sentence that would have kept him in the county prison and near Tara Macher and their two children.

But Ben Simon, county assistant district attorney, argued the prosecution already gave Macher a break by agreeing to a plea arrangement to a charge less significant than the robbery with a weapon.

After court, Simon also contradicted Tara Macher’s claim the robbery victims weren’t scared. Simon said they might have felt relief after learning the pipe bomb was not real, “but it speaks for itself that one of the employees ran out of the store.”

It was almost exactly a year ago on April 15 that Macher walked into the drugstore near the intersection of Route 19 and Rochester Road with his face concealed by a bandanna.

According to court records, Macher threatened to detonate an explosive device — a phony he later admitted was really some PVC piping and part of an old cellular phone — unless the pharmacy employees gave him painkillers.

When one of the employees ran, Macher fled also.

The event was captured on store surveillance cameras. Macher, who still was on parole for an earlier drunken driving conviction, later admitted to being the person on the store video.

“That’s just not him,” said the defendant’s sister, Julie Rodriguez of Ohio. “I don’t think Matt meant to hurt anyone or do anything wrong.”

In addition to his sister and wife, Macher’s mother spoke in court. Each cried in describing how drugs hurt him before the attempted robbery. The women especially stressed Macher always has been a good father to his two children. The judge also was given letters written by the children.

“He’s a wonderful person who fell into a dark place,” Tara Macher said. “He fell into a dark hole but I believe he is ready to crawl out. He is ready for change.”