Dobbs Ferry, New York, July 15, 2007. On some level, every parent and police officer in Dobbs Ferry dreads graduation weekend. It is the time that tradition and the law collide in a nerve-racking display of ‘selective enforcement’. Everyone knows that most of the underage senior class and their families will be drunk by midnight and that the backyards and nature preserves of Dobbs Ferry will be littered with beer cans. But no cops will be in sight.
The underage drinking problem all started with the tragic death of 13-year old Cari Lightner in 1980. She was hit from behind while walking down the street in her suburban California neighborhood by a repeat 47 year-old drunk driver. “Her body was so mutilated that her organs could not be used for donation.” Her mother, Candy, enraged by the lenient two-year sentence handed down by the court founded Mothers Against Drunk Driving. Its goal was to increase the stringency of drunk(en) driving laws to match the severity of the crime. But in an odd mutation of justice, MADD is most notorious for the passage of the Uniform Drinking Age Act of 1984. This act of Congress signed by a reluctant President Reagan eliminates Federal highway grants to any State that does not set its drinking age at 21 years. Thus began the Era of Unde(rage) Prohibition.
Instead of really fixing the drunk(en) driving issue by legislating for real ‘zero tolerance’, i.e., an acceptable blood alcohol level of .00, which would have deprived the general population of a cherished after-hours drink, MADD waivered under the economic pressure from the hospitality and beverage industries. Instead, it focused on the politically expedient issue of teenage drinking. No politician should resist the bad grammar of gaining the support of the Mothers Against Drunk(en) Driving.
Ronald Reagan fretted over signing the bi-partisan bill [the most dangerous bills are always bi-partisan, e.g., Sarbanes-Oxley] because it violated the XX1st Amendment, Repeal of Prohibition. In a backhanded, interstate-commerce-kind-of-way, the XX1st Amendment declares that only the States can regulate alcohol consumption.
Your author pointed out this egregious violation of the Constitution to Dobbs Ferry’s Congresswoman, the Honorable Nina Lowey and received no reply. Granted, she was elected to Congress in 1988, four long years after the Uniform Drinking Age Act, and is not culpable, but a simple ‘thanks for your thoughts’ reply would have been polite.
The net effect of the Uniform Drinking Age Act was that, after the requisite unsuccessful Supreme Court challenge by ‘wacky’ states’ rights advocates, every state of the Union had to rise its drinking age to 21 years to keep its highways in good repair.
For a number of years, the Dobbs Ferry Police enforced the underage drinking laws with restraint. But with the election of Jeanine Pierro, Republican, to the office of District Attorney, Westchester County, in 1993, the reign of terror against teenage turpitude began. She founded the Underage Drinking Task Force. The Task Force’s mission was to track down and stamp out underage drinking wherever it might occur. Police officers were reported in the Juehring Estate behind Cricket Lane in camouflage gear with night vision goggles hunting down keg parties. Four or more parked cars were grounds for illegal entry. Thankfully, the Task Force seems to have gone the way of Ms. Pirro’s political career — it has sunk into oblivion.
Which brings us back to graduation weekend, where it is tradition in Dobbs Ferry to attend at least a dozen backyard parties, where the alcohol flows as freely as the congratulatory hugs. Luckily, under New York State law, these backyard parties are legal, because an underage person can drink in the physical presence of his or her parent or legal guardian. A gentleman by the name of Gary Muldoon, Rochester, New York, has provided an amazingly short and clear summary of these laws at: http://www.mcacp.org/issue41.htm
He states that:
- Under “the Alcohol Beverage Control Law § 65(1), a person may not sell alcohol to a person under age 21.”
- Under the that Penal Law § 260.20(2), adults are barred from giving drinks to minors, “the crime of Unlawfully dealing with a child 1st degree bars providing alcohol to a person under 21”
- But that the Penal Law does not apply to a parent or guardian of a minor!
This little known exception to the law has come as a surprise to a wide cross-section of the Village population, including the beverage vendors. I asked Greenburgh Police Chief, John Kapica, for clarification, and he stated that a permission slip or written document from the parent or guardian would not suffice; the parent or guardian had to be physically present.
So if the police come to your home on graduation weekend make sure that you are only serving kids in the presence of their parents. If you serve an unaccompanied minor and admit it, you will go to jail. It is much wiser to instruct the minor to say that he or she got the drink without your knowledge – in effect stole your liquor – because the minor CANNOT be arrested – contrary to popular belief. Under Alcohol Beverage Control Law § 65-c, possession with intent to consume alcohol by minors is unlawful and prohibited. But accordingly to Mr. Muldoon, the minor can only receive a summons and provide community service that is limited by law to 30 hours.
A summons appears to differ from an arrest under New York State law in that a summons does not allow the police to take the person into custody, i.e., put them in a police car or in some manner, take them to a police station [but consult your personal attorney, because the author has not passed the bar and cannot provide legal advice.]. A summons needs to be served on the spot of the infraction as its “sole function is to achieve a defendant`s court appearance".
The exceptions to all these rules involve automobiles. If a minor is found driving with a blood alcohol level of .more than .08, he or she loses the right to drive until age 21 and may face criminal charges. Between .02 and .07, apparently criminal charges are less common but the minor will face “administrative hearing and sanctions per Vehicle & Traffic Law §§ 1192-a, 1194-a.” Below .02, which is less than one drink in the previous hour, the law appears to be permissive, but I won’t rely on it and you should consult your personal attorney.
The bottom line is that the laws surrounding underage drinking are not well understood by the general population and our elected officials. After Dr. and Mrs Taxin were led away in handcuffs by the Greenburgh police, I suggested to Paul Feiner, Democrat, Greenburgh Supervisor, that he organize an education session to clear up the issue. Instead, he suggested that I organize the session and he would attend. The Trustees of the Village of Dobbs Ferry should hold a public hearing to explain underage drinking laws and to determine whether or not these laws are being properly and consistently enforced in the Village.
In the meantime, I suggest that the Honorable Nina Lowey stop the practice of ‘selective enforcement’ by either (1) cracking down on this ‘parent/guardian’ loophole in the Penal Law and immediately blocking Federal highway funds to her constituents; or (2) repealing the unconstitutional Uniform Drinking Age Act. Then all our men and women in uniform – not just those over 21 years — can celebrate their return from Iraq with a drink of champagne – without being in the presence of a parent or guardian.
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