Thursday, August 21, 2008

Wal-Mart rings up no-sale on liquor

Recently a friend recommended a certain wine after serving it with dinner. I figured it had come off the high-priced shelf of a local liquor mart, but she mentioned having purchased it at Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart? Yep! After reading the name of the wine on my shopping list for about three weeks, I finally decided to stop at Wal-Mart, and yesterday I did.

When I asked the greeter where the liquor section was, she pointed me in the right direction but added that they could not sell liquor yesterday or today. She pointed to a sign on the door, which informed me that Wal-Mart was serving a two-day suspension for liquor law violation.

I didn't ask the details, but in many cases merchants are caught when police conduct a sting. The cops send in an under-age person (read, "minor") to buy liquor. I myself object to stings of this type and believe minors should not be used as decoys to help the police in their enforcement efforts.

If the cops want to use a youthful-appearing (but of legal age) police officer, that's okay with me. But sending a kid in with an obviously-altered ID or even with his own ID showing an age too young for purchase of alcohol is, in my opinion, a serious error in judgement. In fact, judges ought to throw out such cases.

One of the problems may be that liquor law violations are often enforced on a local level, where the merchant appears before the local liquor commission. Are all rules of law followed in the local "court"?

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