The Smithville Beer Board has delayed action on possible punishment against two local stores accused of selling alcohol to a minor after managers at both businesses claim the clerks who made the transactions mistakenly entered the wrong date of birth into their computers when making the sales.
During a hearing Tuesday evening at city hall, managers of both Mapco Express on East Broad Street and the Discount Tobacco Store on West Broad Street (across from Dairy Queen) say they can produce receipts and video evidence of the transactions to back up their claims.
The beer board voted to reschedule the hearing for Tuesday, November 3 at 5:30 p.m. at city hall.
The two store clerks, 32 year old Jennifer Sims of McMinnville, an employee of the Discount Tobacco Store, and 56 year old Allison Ferguson of Smithville, a store clerk at Mapco Express were cited last month for the illegal sale of alcohol to a minor under 21 years of age as part of an undercover operation conducted jointly by the Smithville and Alexandria Police Departments and the DeKalb County Sheriff’s Department. Two other stores, one in the county and the other in Alexandria are also accused of making an illegal beer sale. All four defendants are to appear in General Sessions Court on October 29.
In each case, the same operative, a 20 year old man, was sent into the stores and bought beer.
During Tuesday evening’s hearing, Lieutenant Detective Matt Holmes informed the beer board that the undercover operation was conducted based on general public complaints of illegal beer sales in the city. The two stores were not targeted based on any specific complaints. “After receiving several complaints periodically about illegal sales to minors within the city limits, we conducted an undercover investigation using a 20 year old (operative). We encompassed all licensees in the city that sell alcoholic beverages. We visited each one individually,” said Detective Holmes.
But while all other store clerks in the city carded and refused to sell beer to the underage operative, Detective Holmes said sales were made to him at both the Discount Tobacco Store and at Mapco Express. In both cases, he bought a six pack of Bud Lite. The first buy was made from Sims at the Discount Tobacco Store at 12:44 p.m. on September 23. The second purchase was made thirty six minutes later at 1:20 p.m. from Ferguson at Mapco Express .
Local and district managers from the two stores appeared before the beer board Tuesday night to give an explanation. While they admit that beer sales were made to the young man from their establishments, they claim it was unintentional in that both clerks simply misread the birth date on the identification he presented and they entered the very same incorrect information into their computers to verify whether he was of legal age to buy beer. Instead of his actual birth date of December 22, 1994, both clerks entered into their systems the date of December 22, 1984.
Could it be merely a coincidence that both clerks made the exact same mistake?
The store managers don’t think so.
“We have an electronic system where we enter the data. We have found out that the two violators on this entered the exact same date. There are two people (Sims and Ferguson), blocks apart that don’t know each other who entered the exact same date for this young man. Instead of entering his birth date as December 22, 1994 they entered December 22, 1984 at both locations,” said the Manager of Mapco Express.
“They both checked the ID but neither one saw it right,” said the district manager of the Discount Tobacco Store.
“On our Point of Sale (POS) system, they (clerks) actually have to type in the birth date of this person (customer) to allow the sale and it will compute whether they are old enough. She (Ferguson) was trying to type this in and it wouldn’t accept it. She tried multiple attempts and she finally got it to go in. I don’t know what she saw, but she told me later what she thought she saw was the year 1984 (on the young man’s ID),” said the manager of Mapco.
“When you scan the beer, the birthday (data request) will pop up. You basically do (enter) the month, day, and the year and if they (customers) are under 21 it will say under legal age and will become unable to process,” added the district manager of the Discount Tobacco Store.
Although Ferguson has apparently lost her job at Mapco due to this allegation, the Mapco manager said she had worked there since the 1990’s and had never been accused of this before. “She had done a wonderful job controlling second party sales for this city. The kind of sales that really hurt us. The person coming in who is 20 years old trying to buy beer is not the problem. The real problem is that person who has a friend who is 21 years old. Allison has done probably the best of anybody I have ever seen at controlling all sales,” said the Mapco manager.
Beer Board member Steve Hays asked City Attorney Vester Parsley whether a decision by the board could be delayed until after the outcome of the criminal citations against Sims and Ferguson in court.
Parsley said the beer board could do whatever it wishes but added that a final court decision may not come on October 29th. He said there may also be delays in court that could drag on for weeks or months.
The city attorney also reminded the beer board that it’s job is not to act as judge and jury on the guilt or innocence of the clerks who are alleged to have made the beer sales, but only to find whether illegal sales were actually made from the stores in violation of the city’s beer ordinance.
If found in violation, the city’s ordinance calls for a first offense 90 day suspension of the stores’ beer licenses.
The Smithville Beer Board is made up of members Annette Greek, Steve Hays, Farron Hendrix, Danny Washer, and Lloyd Black. All were present Tuesday night except Black.
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