it's a story that for correspondent megan thompson is very personal. >> reporter: carol thompson in minnesota was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2009. for part of the year, she paid more than $400 a month out of pocket for her brand name drug, because of her insurance plan's high detectable. a couple years later, after the drug called letrozol went genetic, the price dropped dramatically, to around $10 at her local costco. always looking for a better deal she decided to ask another big chain about its retail price. >> the gentleman looked it up and he came back to me with a price of around $400. and i said to him, oh, can't be. you must be looking at the brand name drug. it can't be that expensive. >> reporter: but there was no mistake. one store quote add price 40 times more than the other. how could that be? especially when gentlemeric dru are thought to be more inexpensive. >> i was shocked. confused. what am i missing? this isn't compute. >> reporter: she never been an activist fell compelled to try to figure this out. >> i started and my own to phone other pharmacies in the twin cities

megan thompson reports. >> if i can't control what you're going do do, i can control what you're goingthat means in the future if you violate any of the conditions of probation you can count on me giving you some jail time. >> this isn't the way things used to be. when judge stephen alm was assigned to a felony trial courtroom in honolulu in 2004 he saw judges routinely warning offenders to follow the rules of probation and probationers just as routinely ignoring those warnings. >> at sentencing the judge says no drugs. you have to see your probation officer. you have your to pay your restitution and in the real world they go out and violate those conditions and typically there's no consequences. >> no consequence because the only threat was years of in prison. and that threat was usually carried out after dozens of violations over months or years. >> i thought what a crazy way to try to change anybody's behavior. >> so people just aren't reforming. they're not getting better. >> they're not. they're getting worse j. >> reporter: judge alm with a reputation as one of the toughest sente

for correspondent megan thompson, the story started close to home, when her mother started shopping for an affordable alternative to a brand name breast cancer medication. here's an excerpt from her report. >> one store quoted a price forty times more than the other. how could that be? especially when generic drugs are commonly thought to be so inexpensive. >> i was shocked. i was confused. i thought, "what am i missing? you know, this doesn't compute." >> thompson, who'd never been a consumer activist, said she felt compelled to try to figure this out. >> i started just on my own to phone some other pharmacies in the twin cities here. >> reporter: last june, she made another round of calls like she did more than a year prior. and what she found was that nothing had changed: wildly varying prices for her generic breast cancer drug. >> hi, would you be able to check the price of a drug for me? a 30-day supply of letrozole? >> $11.04. >> it's $29.88. >> $45.99. >> $364.99 >> ooh, i didn't realize it was that much. it's $435. >> $455. >> it didn't seem fair. and it seemed to me especially