Four Stores Alleged To Sell Alcohol To Minors

The Department of Consumer Protection is releasing the results of an undercover compliance operation over the weekend in our city. Agents from the Department’s Liquor Control Division and officers from the Middletown Police Department conducted a series of compliance checks at all package stores and grocery stores licensed to sell beer in the city. Volunteer minors who had been trained by the Governor's Prevention Partnership assisted with the compliance checks. Of the 18 stores tested for compliance, it is alleged that four (4) failed by selling alcoholic liquor to a minor. The four stores that allegedly failed are:

1. Aresco’s Market
2. Forest City Wine & Spirits
3. King of Spirits
4. The Wine Cellar

“Compliance checks help us to identify businesses that are selling to minors, and we routinely conduct random checks in towns across the state,” Consumer Protection Commissioner William M. Rubenstein said. “Our objective is to find businesses that knowingly or unknowingly sell alcohol to minors and bring them into compliance with state law.”

However, he added, compliance checks are not intended to hurt local businesses.

“We don’t try to trick or entice establishments to sell alcoholic beverages to youth,” Rubenstein said. “If asked for proof of age before making a liquor purchase, the volunteer youth will hand over his or her actual photo I.D.”

The Commissioner expressed the Department’s thanks to the Middletown Police Department for its assistance in this compliance check and to the Governor’s Prevention Partnership for its ongoing support of efforts to reduce youth access to liquor.

The businesses that allegedly sold to a minor will be brought before the Liquor Control Commission for an administrative hearing, at which time they will have an opportunity to address the charges.