St. Patty’s Day Underage Drinking Raids
Crime, News — By Cliff Jett on March 23, 2010 at 1:13 amAbout two dozen people were busted for underage drinking at TD’s Sports Bar and Knight Library during St. Patrick’s Day festivities, according to a tipster who e-mailed KnightNews.com.
KnightNews.com was waiting for confirmation from Florida’s Division of Alcoholic Beverages and Tobacco before reporting about the bust, but the Orlando Sentinel confirmed through its sources Monday that the bust happened.
Those caught drinking underage were not handcuffed and booked into jail, as has previously been the case during underage drinking raids KnightNews.com has covered. This time, those accused of drinking underage were issued written arrests and given notices to appear in court.
If convicted, a judge could throw offenders in jail for 60 days or force them to pay a $500 fine, according to the Sentinel.
Eyewitnesses told KnightNews.com one person was injured during a fight at the event. Thousands of partiers showed up to the shopping plaza, directly across from UCF, to take part in Knight Library’s party as well as those as DEKO and FUBAR.
According to the Sentinel, bars selling to underage students could face fines of $1,000 or even see their liquor licenses suspended for one week — just for a first offense.
The Sentinel reported its calls seeking comment from Knight Library were not immediately returned, but reported “a management staffer at Knight Library who wouldn’t provide his name said employees stamped the hands of underage patrons at the block party with a black ‘X’ to indicate they could not order a drink.”
“All others received a bright orange wristband, which allowed them to order alcoholic beverages,” the paper reported the manager said.
The Sentinel reported the state has been increasing pressure against Knight Library by sending agents into the bar to hunt for violations.
During the last major underage drinking bust KnightNews.com covered, Knight Library had no arrests, however, Scoop, Devaney’s, TD’s and Amigos did.
KnightNews.com is still trying to get more information on this crackdown on UCF area bars. Check back for updates.
Let us know what you think in the comments section. Do you think UCF bars are being unfairly targeted by the state — or do all bars undergo this amount of scrutiny? Speak out below, and we could use your comment in our next article.
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13 Comments
Library should be raided every weekend until they stop letting 18 year olds in the bar. They allow 18 and up in their bar 7 nights a week. That is why they get raided by police all of the time and have so many arrests. David you say nothing will happen to them, you might want to wait and see how long they have their liquor license for. They are fighting in court to keep it according to the reports, and im sure the state will win that fight or just keep raiding it till its out of business.
“I think all the underage kids should stay at TD’s where they belong.”
lmao
Nothing is going to happen to library, they are doing their job and checking every persons ID. I think all the underage kids should stay at TD’s where they belong.
Knightnews did the right thing putting this story out, even if it ruins Knight Librarys reputation. Since Knight Library is getting raided by undercover ATF every weekend, UCF students should know so they can stay away. You can get kicked out of school, pay fines, go to jail, and do community service if you get caught drinking in a Knight Library raid, not to mention it stays on your criminal record for life. Its just not worth it, and im glad Knightnews let me know so I dont go to jail for being 20 and drinking every weekend like every other college student in the country.
That’s because Knight News has integrity. The Future has an editor working at FUBAR. They had to know about the manager being arrested but the Future ignored that story anyway. At least Knight News will tell you the truth and let you make your own opinion, no matter what it is.
Haha, Knightnews would sponsor a bar and its block party, kiss their butt for months, then write a story that will probably put them out of business. you gotta admit, Knightnews tells it like it is. Im not going to library for a while till the police stop raiding it, which will be never cuz they are obviously trying to shut it down, an by the sounds of it they will lose their liquor license and shut down. Oh well, it was a cool place to go, but its game over now.
“Knight’s library is, without a doubt, the number one place to celebrate St. Patty’s day this year.
KnightNews.com is an official sponsor of the event for one main reason: there is no other bar that brings the same incredible crowd, block party, bands and overall vibe as this bar is able to do each year.”
yeah, library has to go to court for bartenders serving underage in 2006, like the sentinel said. they will probably lose there liquor license. library had 90 percent of the arrests. they were packed with 4000 people. nobody went to tds that night, everybody was at library.
good article! This is hilarious that the ATF and ABT think they have any chance at stopping underage drinking at UCF bars. They have no hope..they are wasting their time. All the bar owners around here own the ABT and ATF and just pay them off for every bust that goes down. When there are thousands of students underage drinking every night around all the bars there is no way they can stop it by just busting 24. They need to focus their efforts on more important problems like firearms.. ATF= Alcohol Tobaco and Firearms…so why are they waisting time on alcohol control when guns are killing way more people than alcohol underage drinking..just let theese kids underage drink…give up ATF and ABT. get a new job!
i hope they close down library. that place is unsanitary and the staff is a bunch of pricks.
this is essentially a tax on the bars and those that are underage drinking, this bust alone could bring the government 10000 dollars for only those drinking, and up to 1000 dollars a bar for each offense i’m sure. and tax revenue is always good, at least from the governments point of view
they cant arrest you for putting pictures of underage drinking on facebook so who cares
I personally think the drinking age should be the majority age (18), but apparently age 18 is starting to get less and less rights (can’t drink, conceal carry, and now can’t get credit cards without parental co-sign).
But maybe KnightNews should do some research and report their findings? Although if they did underage drinking stings at UF, probably their entire underclassmen underage population would be arrested, and it would tarnish UF’s reputation (god forbid!).
And a word of advice: if you’re underage, don’t put pictures up on Facebook of yourself drinking. Just sayin’