IN RE: Application of H.C. ENTERTAINMENT CORP. (2000)

Determination of respondent State Liquor Authority, dated August 12, 1998, suspending petitioner's liquor license for 15 days and imposing a $2500 fine, upon a finding that petitioner sold liquor to a minor in violation of Alcoholic Beverage Control Law § 65(1), unanimously confirmed, the petition denied and the proceeding brought pursuant to CPLR article 78 (transferred to this Court by order of the Supreme Court, New York County [Beverly Cohen, J.], entered December 22, 1998), dismissed, without costs.

 Substantial evidence that petitioner violated Alcoholic Beverage Control Law § 65(1) was provided by the undercover officer's testimony that an underage auxiliary police officer who accompanied him was served six alcoholic beverages from three different bartenders without being asked for identification.   Also offered was the auxiliary officer's driver's licence and police identification card, both of which demonstrated that he was under the age of 21 at that time (see, O.F.B., Inc. v. New York State Liq. Auth., 212 A.D.2d 373, 622 N.Y.S.2d 259).   Noting petitioner's prior adjudicated violations, including narcotics violations in 1996, the penalty does not shock our sense of fairness (cf., id.).

MEMORANDUM DECISION.