Title: State v. Wuerslin

State: vermont

Issuer: Vermont Supreme Court

Document:

State v. Wuerslin (2001-523); 174 Vt. 570; 816 A.2d 445

[Filed 30-Oct-2002]

                                 ENTRY ORDER

                      SUPREME COURT DOCKET NO. 2001-523

                             OCTOBER TERM, 2002


  State of Vermont	               }	APPEALED FROM:
                                       }
                                       }
       v.	                       }	District Court of Vermont,
                                       }	Unit No. 2, Bennington Circuit
  Hasso W. Wuerslin	               }
                                       }	DOCKET NO. 533-5-01Bncr

                                                Trial Judge:  David A. Howard

             In the above-entitled cause, the Clerk will enter:


       This is an appeal from a denial of a motion to dismiss a charge
  against defendant for furnishing alcohol to a minor, a violation of 7
  V.S.A. § 658.  Defendant entered into a conditional plea, preserving the
  issue that the charge should be dismissed because it arose out of an
  invalid sting operation conducted by the Vermont Department of Liquor
  Control.  We affirm.

       On the evening of April 12, 2001, Winhall Police Officer Elizabeth
  Graham, DLC Investigator Tom Curran and DLC employee C.K., who is under the
  age of twenty-one, went to the Equinox Hotel bar as part of a DLC
  compliance check.  C.K. sat down at the bar and ordered a beer.  Appellant
  was the bartender working that night.  In contravention of DLC General
  Regulation 13, requiring bartenders to demand positive identification from
  persons of questionable age before furnishing them with alcohol, defendant
  did not request identification from C.K. and proceeded to serve her the
  beer she ordered.  Officer Elizabeth Graham witnessed the sale.
  Investigator Curran issued a citation to bartender Wuerslin for Furnishing
  Alcohol to a Minor, in violation of 7 V.S.A. § 658.  Defendant moved to
  dismiss the charge on the grounds that the sting operation procedures
  should have been established by rule making or regulations promulgated
  pursuant to the Vermont Administrative Procedure Act (VAPA), 3 V.S.A. §§
  801-849.  The State argued that formal rule making is unnecessary because
  the DLC's authority to enforce laws prohibiting the sale of liquor to
  minors is inherent and self-executing.  The trial court held that while the
  Department of Liquor Control is charged with adopting regulations to
  implement its administrative authority to control the sale of liquor under
  7 V.S.A. § 104, its authority to enforce the liquor laws with respect to
  minors, found in subsection 1, is self-executing.  Therefore, the trial
  court concluded that the Department's sting operation was incidental to the
  Department's expressly authorized powers and there was no violation of the
  VAPA.
   
       Defendant raises two issues, but we do not reach the second because
  the first disposes of the appeal.  Defendant argues that the Department's
  use of sting operations to catch bartenders who serve alcohol to minors
  represents a rule of general applicability, and as such, should have been
  promulgated as a rule under the VAPA.  Defendant relies principally on our
  decision in Parker v. Gorczyk, __ Vt. __,