The Warner Robins City Council administered punishment and also sent a clear signal to any other establishment within its boundaries: Selling alcohol to anyone under age will not be tolerated.
The group, during its meeting Monday, voted in favor of suspending the alcohol license of the Stop N Go on Gawin Drive in Warner Robins for 30 days for selling beer to a person under the age of 21.
If that doesn’t seem like much – to the owner you know it did – it should, especially considering what went into it.
For starters, the preliminary recommendation from Warner Robins Police Lt. Lance Watson, who initiated the case, was for probation. Initially, explained City Clerk M. Stanley Martin, Watson was going to request the council suspend the business’s license for 10 days.
But after delving deeper – taking into consideration several things including it being theirs and the store clerk’s first offense, as well as having no prior complaints there, and the incident occurring during a shift change (plus he said he had “about” six others worse that were coming the council’s way) – he opted for something different.
“So I would be OK,” he said, “if we just went to a probationary period where we could just go back and check. I feel comfortable with them saying they were going to correct the problem.
“On circumstances like that,” he added in regard to the store reportedly being crowded and the two clerk’s swapping out each thinking the other had checked the ID, “I can understand a little bit more than some of these others.
“You know, where you’ve got someone who’s supposed to be checking IDs and then you’ve got this person here who’s serving (i.e. at a night club where the person taking your cover charge checks your ID and then the bartender serves you). Where if this person right here (the person taking the cover charge) fails, it collapses.
“So it’s one of those circumstances where I’m a little bit more lenient or more willing to go with a warning.”
The store clerk, who reportedly had nearly 20 years of convenience store experience, and owner also had a character witness. In regard to the clerk, the witness said she had known her since 1988, and had been her supervisor at one point at another store.
“I’ve been in the store,” she said, “and seen times when a drunk ... and a drunk can get awful mean when he wants his beer ... But I’ve seen her be really nice but still refuse to sell to a drunk.”
As far as the storeowner, she said she had seen one time when a customer came in – a mother with small children. “She didn’t have any money and just wanted milk and bread for her children. He told her to go ahead and get it and then pay him when she could.”
Despite that, a nerve was already struck with Councilman Bob Wilbanks. In regard to the shift change and the possible confusion, he said: “That’s really no excuse. Whoever takes the money checks the ID. It doesn’t really matter if 15 change and 17 people come in.
“It doesn’t really matter. Somebody buys alcohol in your store, you check ID.” And then following some debate as to how long of a probation it would be for – the timeframe initially mentioned was six-12 months ... “And I assure you I would get out there several times,” Watson said ... Wilbanks added this: “(I’m) not trying to be ... But everybody is warned. I mean you know you don’t sell alcohol to an underage person. Is the employee paying $310 dollars (the fine she had to pay) something serious done to the company?” (The consensus was “no”.)
“I’m making it tough on people on purpose. Because we’ve got people driving drunk in Warner Robins. Our police are undermanned. They’re working hard every day to keep this from happening.
“I go out and ride with them in a police car and somebody comes at us in the wrong lane ... We’ve got a problem. We don’t sell alcohol to underage people in Warner Robins. And we’re not going to, and we’re not going to tolerate people who do.
“So I’ll go along with the recommendation, you’ll outvote me anyway. But understand this (he aimed this comment directly at the owner in attendance). It better not happen again.”
To that end, the group verbally committed, before leaving the work session for the meeting, to giving the owner a six-month probationary-type warning. But Wilbanks’ words must have hit home on the way. Instead of offering up probation, Tom Simms Jr., made the aforementioned motion to suspend. And it carried 4-2 in favor.
Note: See Saturday’s Houston Home Journal for more on the Warner Robins City Council – other things it voted into law, et cetera, during its meeting.
