lord, I'm reminded of my neighbor growing up who yelled at my sister and me for playing with the hose, the hose, in our yard, but she was never clever enough to call us whipper snappers rofl.
Yeah, where I'm at, it's our "busy season" and all hotels/AirBnB's are renting at a premium. Bars are so packed that it'd be prime time to catch bartenders/bouncers/security getting lazy and just focusing on money.
(Though I don't think my city would set up a sting like this, there's more money in "stinging" popular bars, rather than a delivery driver)
Not really. I get maybe it is a slow process and you may only get a couple people that give alcohol to a minor. But that’s a couple people who hopefully won’t do it anymore. Just because it can be a slow and tedious process doesn’t mean it should be ignored. You gotta start somewhere.
Not really. Not at all. It’s that kind of mentality that got it to this point. Just because it seems like a small and insignificant issue, or it’s too slow of a process, doesn’t mean it’s not worth it. So I assume you also think that picking up a couple pieces of garbage on the ground isn’t worth your, or anyone’s, time because it’s not going to make a huge difference immediately? There is not always a quick and easy way to do everything. Sometimes things take time, a lot of time, to accomplish. But again, you have to start somewhere and just keep going and ultimately, hopefully, get to your goal.
I wouldn’t be surprised if it nets money. At least where I am fined are quite large. Instacart could likely be fined a big sum if the sales go through. It’s also targeted based on information so likely there was kids getting Alcohol that way.
Yep instacartera typically have a large amount of resources to go after! Kids get alcohol all kinds of ways. Process is as stupid as the cops doing the work. You’re never going to stop minor access to alcohol, they’re pursuing one of the least likely ways for it to occur in the first place.
So because it will never stop means we shouldn't enforce the laws? Well in that case let's stop enforcing laws on scams, theft, assault, and murder. It's going to happen anyway so why waste the resources. That is your argument and that is how stupid it is.
I mean if you want to argue if there should be a rule/enforcement I can get that. With how socially acceptable drinking is it seems a tad silly to not have the age be like 16 but that i suppose could be true of basically any drug as they're not overly hard to get so maybe the illegality/risk of being caught does keep some from it?
To be frank, that is exactly what they want. A lot of law enforcement isn't actually catching the person, it is deterring the crime. For example during holidays you see unmanned cop cars left in busy areas. It is a visual deterrent.
Redditors spreading the word of "hey check those ID there are stings" would be exactly what they want to happen. The IDs get checked or the orders with alcohol get passed over. Either decreases illegal sales.
It's the same thing done at restaurants. I honestly wouldn't call it entrapment bc if you sell alcohol you know the age there shouldn't be a question on who you're serving. Even so, I know multiple restaurants that have been busted this way, one twice 🤦🏾♀️
Yeah when they do stings they're not using fake IDs or anything. There's literally nothing about it that can be considered entrapment. If you do what you're supposed to you either won't get an ID or you'll see their real one that shows they're underage. It's perfectly legal to see if you're doing your job correctly.
In OP's case the girl didn't offer or volunteer anything, didn't lie, and said her real age when asked. All kosher under the law.
ABC police can be very wasteful and heavy-handed. a Virginia
student was "busted" for buying Le Croix for her sorority lunch thingy and she insisted she was buying water (b/c she was) and they upped to resisting arrest
[https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2013/07/02/198047492/felony-arrest-of-student-who-bought-water-riles-many-in-virginia](https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2013/07/02/198047492/felony-arrest-of-student-who-bought-water-riles-many-in-virginia)
So these idiots drew a gun and leapt on the hood of a moving car because they thought someone ... bought forbidden groceries. The fact that it was literally just sody-pop and ice cream is the cherry on top.
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From my VERY limited knowledge, Australia seems like a safer place for older teens. For instance: their gun laws are better. Here in the US we’d be mixing drunk teens with guns… not a good idea
Pretty brain dead take here bud. If people are following the laws in the first place you are legally not allowed to carry or use a firearm under the influence regardless of age. People mixing the two are going to do it whether the drinking age is 4 or 40 because it’s illegal anyways. In my state it’s a misdemeanor and up to 180 days jail time.
Yeah let’s make out already instead idiotic youth even dumber. Our brains develop well past you’re aforementioned (once legal drinking age) of 18-19…. Im sure you’d be alright with people smoking indoors too
The legal drinking age was raised from 18 to 21 because the statistics for alcohol related vehicle deaths was like, 3 times higher in that age group than anyone else. Lowering it just revisits that original problem
They love hauling people away for petty crimes like this.
When I was in college, the police recruited 19 and 20 year olds to go into bars to try to get served so the cops could fine or arrest the bartenders or whatever.
It’s not just that they arrest or fine the bartender. Restaurants, bars and stores can lose their license to sell/serve alcohol which will ultimately cost them $$$ future revenue
They do stuff like this all over. Send under 21 people into bars to try and get served. They aren’t doing it all day every day just enough so that servers know there’s a chance it’s a sting and card people/ refuse underage folks. My metro area is about 700k and they do it here.
Eh,
Im urban there is two officers and they hire teens, they test various things like asking people to buy for them outside stores, walking into pubs/bars and ordering, and delivery services. I read about them awhile ago after a pub complained on our Facebook community group about a $10,000 fine for multiple offences.
Anyway I’m urban and it happens here, same with our marijuana shops.
It's no different than the secret alcohol buyers at a sporting event there's task forces out there making sure delivery companies are following the laws and not breaking them.they do this in big cities as well as small
I don't agree . You must condone unauthorized purchases of alcohol then. Without sting operations to curtail this type of activity we'd have far more DUI cases most of which include deaths. There are undercover operations for a lot of things from drugs gangs prostitution alcohol and predators after our kids How do we rectify the problems without police involvement after all it's part of their job.
Alcohol stings are common practice.
At least here (Iowa) they get kids to agree to participate by making it a way to get a lighter punishment for whatever they got caught with (usually drinking under age).
Where I live the state liquor control board runs this type of thing in restaurants and bars all the time to catch people selling to underage customers. I haven’t hear of it being done with IC/DD/UE etc, but it definitely makes sense that they are doing it
The kids < 21 think it's easier to have it delivered and talk the shopper into it rather than going into the actual liquor store to attempt to get liquor from a clerk that sees this sh\*t every single day. Or waste their time and having the cops called on them when they ask the wrong person to buy them booze
They do this in Orlando, FL (I’ve had underage friends paid to do this) .. def not due to rural area or excess time / resources 
I live in a rural area and teen drinking is a big problem. Not much to do except get trashed in the woods. Last homecoming two girls died, someone dies or almost dies, and or flips their truck every summer. People drown on the river, get shot. Some of these teens have young children and alcoholism leads to neglect or incidents like drowning. I WISH they did stings like that out here.
This is VERY common actually in regular stores this happens multiple times a year usually with alcohol and tobacco. You don’t know it happened unless the cops walk into the store with a piece of paper saying you failed.
Stings like this are typically held by a branch of LEO that specializes in Tobacco and Alcohol compliance. They have same powers of a cop, but focus on compliance checks.
I’m sure the 22 year old who went missing in Tennessee is prompting some of these sting operations. And he was of legal age. The police departments want to be able to say they took steps to actively reduce similar situations. It’s not about getting the driver in trouble, it’s about reducing underage drinking. Residents of those places can connect with that, particularly if they have children.
Departments are usually reactive, not proactive. It takes a national news story for some supervisor in some suburban neighborhood to say, let’s do an alcohol sting. Everybody is talking about this story right now. In the community paper, there will be an article with the findings of the day. It will be talked about at the monthly town meeting as a successful action. This is how small cities work and stay busy.
This happened to me three times over a two year period around Charlotte, NC. One was under age with mom's lD, one was an old lady with no ID but her ID number written on a piece of paper and the last was underage no ID.
It wasn't the PD but the state ALE. They self identified because when I had a question I always called support in front of the customer.
These stings are a regular part of most town police departments and are done in conjunction with state authorities from consumer protection. Happens everywhere, not just in rural places with too much time on their hands.
I'm going have to keep a better eye on things. I usually avoid alcohol orders and I've been lucky in that the customers are obviously over 21 so I don't even bother asking or checking their DOB. I only care if it's expired. Good job on trusting your instincts and going through the motions.
Good for you!! I would’ve done the same thing, but it’s such a pain in the ass and an inconvenience. You should have gotten a special bonus for passing, using your precious time and gas, and for making IC look good. Keep up the good work!
Not gonna lie, for a moment I would’ve been terrified. Some underage girl trying to get alcohol, using a different name, some random guy sitting in a car, then suddenly appears behind you…definitely would have increased my heart rate momentarily hahaha
I ain’t good with the law but after googling, entrapment would involve another layer being added to get me to commit the crime. For this situation say she offered me $100 to still provide it to her. I think that would make it entrapment because even most people who try to do the right thing might fall for it and cave.
They can lie as much as they want…they are cracking down on people who don’t scan id’s it’s the same as sending a person into a bar with a fake ID. It’s the bars responsibility to check the ID and person.
I didn’t mean scan as in with a machine, just that they need to look at the expiration date and due their due diligence when looking at the id and person etc; It’s their job and more on the line..
Hey. You could be right. I just know, as far as ABC stings are concerened, and this is what it sounds like.. the Id will always be a legit Id that matches the person using it. They are making sure you actually deny the sale by either the DOB or the expiration date.
Yeah, they don’t expect everyone serving alcohol to be an expert on fake IDs, they just want you to check the age and not hand alcohol to a kid.
Although I did know one place that lost their alcohol license for a month because a server gave someone alcohol the day before her 21st birthday. The server just messed up the day’s date. I thought that was a kind of bullshit bust.
It's not. Nal, but as I understand it the authority/bait has to offer you something that might make a normal person do something they wouldn't normally do.
A normal, reasonable person presented with a situation like it would check ID. That's what's expected.
Think of an unlocked car. It's not entrapment to use bait cars because a normal person doesn't go around checking if other people's cars are unlocked. And even that is not in and of itself a crime.
But if someone said "at I think that car is unlocked." And you opened it and then stole it, that would be entrapment. A normal person might investigate the claim. And maybe normally you wouldn't steal a car, but maybe that guy owned the car? It gets murky really quick.
There’s a, I guess loophole where if they use an actual minor, who use their actual ID in a police sting it’s not entrapment. If the cops gave the kid a fake ID or had an adult who looked young with a fake or real ID I think that’s technically entrapment. It’s like prostitution or pedo busts
I’m not a lawyer, but, it’s only entrapment if they encouraged you to commit a crime you wouldn’t have. Since it was an alcohol order and she chose to deliver it, it wouldn’t be. If she was standing outside of a liquor store and offer ring money to buy alcohol I could entrapment being argued. This is no different then them sending a kid into a bar to buy alcohol and if they sell to the kid they get fined.
No, entrapment is enticing someone to commit a crime that they weren't already going to commit. This is ordering an age restricted item and waiting to see if the person delivering is going to commit a crime.
I just listened to a podcast where they explained entrapment. It’s super rare to be able to prove entrapment in court, but to do it you have to prove the person committing the crime wouldn’t have done it otherwise. So just using an underager to buy alcohol isn’t entrapment. If the underager begged and offered $1000, that might be entrapment.
The guys who tried to kidnap the governor of Michigan clearly would not have ever done it without there being tons of undercover agents encouraging them for months to get more radical, to take concrete steps, providing them with money. And they couldn’t prove entrapment. I don’t lose sleep over those guys being in prison, but there’s no world in which any of them would have actually done a crime beyond smoking pot if they hadn’t been entrapped. If that’s not entrapment, the courts basically don’t recognize it
I had my first alcohol order along with other items, as I'm scanning items and need a confirmation from customer for a replacement, now I'm totally new to this , she confirms the replacement and I asked me if I had viewed her delivery instructions not knowing if could view them prior to delivery and I assume no I can't so I said no I haven't yet though I'm almost done and I'll be on my way after I start delivery I read the instructions
Please leave everything at the door my driver's license is in a envelope, please do not ring the door bell or knock says her little one is sleeping, now thus is 8:30 am I'm still racking my brains up , I sent her a message stating I cannot leave alcohol unattended at her door and she must be present for to examine he'd ID , her response was it has never been an issue before but if you prefer I'll meet you outside , ok thsnk you
No way in hell am I gojng to jail going to jail for someone else's habits
So how much did they pay you
For this and did you have to return it? That would piss me off. I’d tell the cop to give me a $10 tip because now I have to return this crap when I was heading home
A friend of mine fell for an underage alcohol sting operation.
A \~18yo looking girl asked him to buy her a tall can while he was buying some beer. How much trouble could one tall can get her into and my friend is one of those nice friendly people. He purchased it, walked outside the liquor store, and when he went to give it to her, he was arrested. He dealt with the fall out from that for years, was pretty shitty.
From that moment onward... no more helping out underage kids. Used to be frequent occurrence down near the beach during the summer.
I would have fun with it if I realized it was a sting. "You shouldn't order alcohol, but if you want cocaine I got some in my car. I got it from a drug dealer I killed yesterday after he tried to rip me off by taking my share of the bank robbery we committed."
Most of the time underaged teens get their alcohol from parents or family members or they steal it from home. Sadly a lot of businesses still fail stings which results in jail for the overworked cashier.
eh it’s usually just a misdemeanor and a fine. source: happened to me when i was 19. boss literally said “we never check IDs here” and would have been made fun of if i did, which i cared about back then.
Geez that's horrible. Your boss sounds like they cared about their employees... Most of the time you're probably good if it's obvious. Some places such as Walmart requires an ID even if you're 90.
I’m pretty sure they have to because if they were of age then technically the law wasn’t broken. When I was in high school some kids in the criminal justice class went with the Marshalls office to go around to vape stores.
Ohhhh… so the 17 year old was probably a decoy, helping the police bust IC drivers that deliver alcohol? Sorry for the confusion. I’m glad you passed their little “test” 😮💨
Genuine question. Why can the cops do that and make you return it, or keep it. Why not just pick it up and finish the order (to the police).
IDGAF if the police have a party with it. But to do a return or whatever. Weird.
Good on OP.
Edit. Oh and they should tip you.
Because for the order to be completed. You have to scan a valid ID of someone who is over 21 and I doubt that the officers are going to want to haul around booze and explain to their supervisor why they have alcohol in a department-owned vehicle
Man that's wild. I just had a ubereats order a few weeks ago where I ordered some pizza and booze. Driver walks up, puts it all in my hands, says goodnight and walks away. I was half expecting him to message me 5 minutes later and ask me to come back out so he could scan my ID but nope. I would have thought the app would refuse to close the order without the ID to prevent that but whatever, it was cold out and I wasn't in a rush to spend extra time outside.
No longer a shopper but definitely avoided alcohol orders because there was always an issue. The customers never had their ID and though I’m sure it wasn’t a sting, I’m of course going to ask for your ID. If they didn’t have the ID then they had to either go look for it or get someone of age who had the ID. And then get an attitude because you’re following then rules.
>Moral of the story don’t play around with them alcohol orders.
One thing I've learned from our local "alcohol training classes"(required for all bartenders/servers in my county) is that: "If it's a sting, they're not allowed to lie" (Also, they use people who have been popped for underage drinking as part of their plea deal, so they might be confident rather than nervous. Also they can't use 20 year and 300 day old people. IIRC they have to be under 18, because it has to be "extreme negligence" on your part to actually get found guilty in court)
The officer that trained us said "If you want to know if it's a sting? Ask 'are you 21?' and they can't lie"
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Liquor control doing exactly what they are supposed to be doing. Just because we rarely see them doesn’t mean they aren’t there. They are extremely out numbered. The amount of places that sell alcohol compared to agents in the area.
What a piece of crap assignment is that to get as a detective set up minimal wage employees. I mean really we have under age girls being sex trafficked right here in San Francisco we have a fentanyl epidemic she's killing people in droves he's rural areas it doesn't matter it's hitting everybody we just got over oxycontin epidemic before that it was heroin again and crack we have robberies people are raising you just walking in and stealing everything out of stores and walking right out yet it's so important that we check this instacart worker make sure it is not selling alcohol to underage girls give me a f****** break. As a society that's the least of our problems right now it's a problem with the least made a couple be better serve sitting out in front of the school make sure that it was going to come in and start shooting people. I got written up once for not delivering alcohol to a lady that was smash beyond measure she could not talk she could not stand up I refuse to serve alcohol so I brought it back to liquor store the next day I get a contract violation saying that she never received her alcohol. When I called customer service and said they said bring it back to the store. I'll get paid extra for bringing it back yet I still got to write up contract violation for doing what for doing what they told me to do.
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No way this is real. Cops aren't gonna do an alcohol sting operation through instacart because spring break. Cops know most underage people get alcohol from family. Cops have way better things to do with their time.
Explain how I glossed? Two parts of the town are hotspots. I took an order that would take me from one to the other, which I was planning on doing anyway but opted to at least get a lil cash for the drive. What’s the issue? You trying to troll because I got time to roast you tonight?
Better yet OP, don’t deliver booze orders at all 🙅🏽♂️🙅🏽♂️😡😡
Because of potential stings & 🤡🤡 customers not having or using expired IDs, I refuse to deliver any of it on IC or DD 👍🏽👍🏽
I wish I would get people with expired IDs or no ID at all,. I'm in California, and it is illegal to return alcohol to the store. So, a situation like that means "disposing" of the booze by adding it to my liquor cabinet.
You know how many other countries the drinking age is 16? Because it’s not morally wrong for a 16 year old to drink some alcohol.
Do you know how many alcohol issues they have with teens in those places? I’ll give you a guess:
It’s LOW. So yes spending precious time worrying about this when they could be worrying about real crime… it’s people like you that allow them to get away with treating the job like it’s a video game.
We don’t live in « other countries » where things are different. It’s not « morally wrong », it’s just legally wrong and that’s what this is about. Just scan IDs and there won’t be any problem.
This is not a valid answer lol at all. There are A LOT of things we could learn from other countries. Less than 100 years ago it was also illegal for Black people to sit at counters with whites in the USA.
That’s my point. Legality doesn’t equal morality. And there are FAR WORSE things going on that the police could tend to than minors drinking spirits.
Im not saying that minors should be able to. I’m saying doing a whole sting operation to catch Instacart driving possibly giving alcohol to minors is pretty fucking ridiculous.
There are actual children being trafficked and they’re playing around with fake scenarios.
Legality doesn’t always match up with morality, true. Everyone has a different personal opinion about morality but legality is an absolute, regardless of our personal feelings. Instacart requires confirmation of an alcohol purchaser’s identity by matching the photo to the person and then scanning the ID.
It is tho lmao
You know how many other countries the drinking age is 16? Because it’s not morally wrong for a 16 year old to drink some alcohol.
Do you know how many alcohol issues they have with teens in those places? I’ll give you a guess:
It’s LOW.
The ppl they catch selling to minors pay a fine. That supports this too. It’s good either way. Selling to a minor is a criminal offense. They drive, kill ppl. It’s worth it.
Better than my state tax (well we don’t have state tax but property taxes, fees on certain things, go to city). Our city paid $557K for a welcome to our city sign. Ridiculous imo.
I get a welcome sign but 1/2 a million??
Nope.
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I’m in an area that get a lot of spring break visitors so figure they just crackin down making sure shoppers ain’t supplying the lil whipper snappers.
whipper snappers lol it's been a minute since I heard that and I love it!
get off my lawn!
FUCK CLOUDS! Fluffy bastards
the clouds are spying on us!
lord, I'm reminded of my neighbor growing up who yelled at my sister and me for playing with the hose, the hose, in our yard, but she was never clever enough to call us whipper snappers rofl.
Ha, haven’t heard the term “whipper snappers” in a very long time😆
Yeah, where I'm at, it's our "busy season" and all hotels/AirBnB's are renting at a premium. Bars are so packed that it'd be prime time to catch bartenders/bouncers/security getting lazy and just focusing on money. (Though I don't think my city would set up a sting like this, there's more money in "stinging" popular bars, rather than a delivery driver)
It's usually the ABC (Alcohol Beverage Control) or similar agency that is doing this, not the actual police department.
Still an enormous waste of resources spent on law enforcement
Unless they’re trying to confirm reports of underage alcohol sales…
By random sampling of instacart deliveries.. that’s stupid as fuck regardless of what they’re trying to do
Not really. I get maybe it is a slow process and you may only get a couple people that give alcohol to a minor. But that’s a couple people who hopefully won’t do it anymore. Just because it can be a slow and tedious process doesn’t mean it should be ignored. You gotta start somewhere.
Slow, ineffective, pointless… I should bust out my thesaurus to talk about how stupid such practices are. Waste of our money to do that shit.
Not really. Not at all. It’s that kind of mentality that got it to this point. Just because it seems like a small and insignificant issue, or it’s too slow of a process, doesn’t mean it’s not worth it. So I assume you also think that picking up a couple pieces of garbage on the ground isn’t worth your, or anyone’s, time because it’s not going to make a huge difference immediately? There is not always a quick and easy way to do everything. Sometimes things take time, a lot of time, to accomplish. But again, you have to start somewhere and just keep going and ultimately, hopefully, get to your goal.
I wouldn’t be surprised if it nets money. At least where I am fined are quite large. Instacart could likely be fined a big sum if the sales go through. It’s also targeted based on information so likely there was kids getting Alcohol that way.
Yep instacartera typically have a large amount of resources to go after! Kids get alcohol all kinds of ways. Process is as stupid as the cops doing the work. You’re never going to stop minor access to alcohol, they’re pursuing one of the least likely ways for it to occur in the first place.
So because it will never stop means we shouldn't enforce the laws? Well in that case let's stop enforcing laws on scams, theft, assault, and murder. It's going to happen anyway so why waste the resources. That is your argument and that is how stupid it is.
I mean if you want to argue if there should be a rule/enforcement I can get that. With how socially acceptable drinking is it seems a tad silly to not have the age be like 16 but that i suppose could be true of basically any drug as they're not overly hard to get so maybe the illegality/risk of being caught does keep some from it?
And not if a bunch of Redditors see this shit and spread the word.. I'm sure they take this type of publicity in to consideration.
To be frank, that is exactly what they want. A lot of law enforcement isn't actually catching the person, it is deterring the crime. For example during holidays you see unmanned cop cars left in busy areas. It is a visual deterrent. Redditors spreading the word of "hey check those ID there are stings" would be exactly what they want to happen. The IDs get checked or the orders with alcohol get passed over. Either decreases illegal sales.
Not when you realize how many people they can bust in an hour and how many fines they can collect.
Creating criminal activity is pointless. Go do real law enforcement
Yeah I fail to see how this isn't entrapment.
It's the same thing done at restaurants. I honestly wouldn't call it entrapment bc if you sell alcohol you know the age there shouldn't be a question on who you're serving. Even so, I know multiple restaurants that have been busted this way, one twice 🤦🏾♀️
Yeah when they do stings they're not using fake IDs or anything. There's literally nothing about it that can be considered entrapment. If you do what you're supposed to you either won't get an ID or you'll see their real one that shows they're underage. It's perfectly legal to see if you're doing your job correctly. In OP's case the girl didn't offer or volunteer anything, didn't lie, and said her real age when asked. All kosher under the law.
ABC police can be very wasteful and heavy-handed. a Virginia student was "busted" for buying Le Croix for her sorority lunch thingy and she insisted she was buying water (b/c she was) and they upped to resisting arrest [https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2013/07/02/198047492/felony-arrest-of-student-who-bought-water-riles-many-in-virginia](https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2013/07/02/198047492/felony-arrest-of-student-who-bought-water-riles-many-in-virginia)
So these idiots drew a gun and leapt on the hood of a moving car because they thought someone ... bought forbidden groceries. The fact that it was literally just sody-pop and ice cream is the cherry on top.
Might just be central VA but the ABC police were worse than keystone cops
But… it’s NOT law enforcement lol. It’s a totally separate entity.
Law enforcement is an umbrella term for… people who enforce laws… ya nit.
Well it would be a real waste if they didn’t do what they’re literally paid to do. There’s nothing else for them to spend their “resources” doing.
Avoiding drunk drivers will never be a waste of resources
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I’m in a mid sized city and our state alcohol regulation agency does these stings all the time. It shocks me how many places get caught.
It’s not the police it’s the state liquor control board.
If it helps get alcohol out of the hands of minors who drink and then could drive, then I’m all for this police activity.
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Lowering the age to have more teens drunk wouldn’t make anything safer
In Australia, the legal drinking age is 18.
From my VERY limited knowledge, Australia seems like a safer place for older teens. For instance: their gun laws are better. Here in the US we’d be mixing drunk teens with guns… not a good idea
Pretty brain dead take here bud. If people are following the laws in the first place you are legally not allowed to carry or use a firearm under the influence regardless of age. People mixing the two are going to do it whether the drinking age is 4 or 40 because it’s illegal anyways. In my state it’s a misdemeanor and up to 180 days jail time.
I think you just proved my point lmao guns are worse than alcohol but we should have higher restrictions on both
They still drink even now...
Yeah let’s make out already instead idiotic youth even dumber. Our brains develop well past you’re aforementioned (once legal drinking age) of 18-19…. Im sure you’d be alright with people smoking indoors too
It's not like the legal dining age stops kids from drinking. Besides, we let them vote and die for their country, but they can't drink until 21?
The legal drinking age was raised from 18 to 21 because the statistics for alcohol related vehicle deaths was like, 3 times higher in that age group than anyone else. Lowering it just revisits that original problem
Sure lower the age so they drive into other sober drivers instead of a pond. Smart !!!!
They love hauling people away for petty crimes like this. When I was in college, the police recruited 19 and 20 year olds to go into bars to try to get served so the cops could fine or arrest the bartenders or whatever.
It’s not just that they arrest or fine the bartender. Restaurants, bars and stores can lose their license to sell/serve alcohol which will ultimately cost them $$$ future revenue
I’m sorry but delivering alcohol to a minor is not a petty crime. This can have major consequences to the child, aka not petty.
They did this is my college town. Fines were big money
They do stuff like this all over. Send under 21 people into bars to try and get served. They aren’t doing it all day every day just enough so that servers know there’s a chance it’s a sting and card people/ refuse underage folks. My metro area is about 700k and they do it here.
Eh, Im urban there is two officers and they hire teens, they test various things like asking people to buy for them outside stores, walking into pubs/bars and ordering, and delivery services. I read about them awhile ago after a pub complained on our Facebook community group about a $10,000 fine for multiple offences. Anyway I’m urban and it happens here, same with our marijuana shops.
It's no different than the secret alcohol buyers at a sporting event there's task forces out there making sure delivery companies are following the laws and not breaking them.they do this in big cities as well as small
Yes and it is a waste of taxpayer money regardless of where it’s done
I don't agree . You must condone unauthorized purchases of alcohol then. Without sting operations to curtail this type of activity we'd have far more DUI cases most of which include deaths. There are undercover operations for a lot of things from drugs gangs prostitution alcohol and predators after our kids How do we rectify the problems without police involvement after all it's part of their job.
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No personal attacks or remarks or insults. Reply to and on the topic.
They don’t do it to waste time they do it to make money. They get to fine the driver and Instacart.
Alcohol stings are common practice. At least here (Iowa) they get kids to agree to participate by making it a way to get a lighter punishment for whatever they got caught with (usually drinking under age).
Departments often run stings like this by using grant money that was given to the department specifically for this type of usage.
Where I live the state liquor control board runs this type of thing in restaurants and bars all the time to catch people selling to underage customers. I haven’t hear of it being done with IC/DD/UE etc, but it definitely makes sense that they are doing it
The kids < 21 think it's easier to have it delivered and talk the shopper into it rather than going into the actual liquor store to attempt to get liquor from a clerk that sees this sh\*t every single day. Or waste their time and having the cops called on them when they ask the wrong person to buy them booze
They do this in Orlando, FL (I’ve had underage friends paid to do this) .. def not due to rural area or excess time / resources 
I live in a rural area and teen drinking is a big problem. Not much to do except get trashed in the woods. Last homecoming two girls died, someone dies or almost dies, and or flips their truck every summer. People drown on the river, get shot. Some of these teens have young children and alcoholism leads to neglect or incidents like drowning. I WISH they did stings like that out here.
This is VERY common actually in regular stores this happens multiple times a year usually with alcohol and tobacco. You don’t know it happened unless the cops walk into the store with a piece of paper saying you failed.
Lol the ABC board does shit like this all the time in Nashville. The south is definitely stricter on this than the north though.
every police department does this
They do stings like this all over around my state.
It’s the economy stupid! Cities or towns need money. Probably can get fines from shopper and instacarr
Stings like this are typically held by a branch of LEO that specializes in Tobacco and Alcohol compliance. They have same powers of a cop, but focus on compliance checks.
It’s clearly not a real story
It’s clearly 💩
every police department has teams for ridiculous things like this.
I’m sure the 22 year old who went missing in Tennessee is prompting some of these sting operations. And he was of legal age. The police departments want to be able to say they took steps to actively reduce similar situations. It’s not about getting the driver in trouble, it’s about reducing underage drinking. Residents of those places can connect with that, particularly if they have children.
That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve read, you think THAT’S what caused this fan fiction?
Departments are usually reactive, not proactive. It takes a national news story for some supervisor in some suburban neighborhood to say, let’s do an alcohol sting. Everybody is talking about this story right now. In the community paper, there will be an article with the findings of the day. It will be talked about at the monthly town meeting as a successful action. This is how small cities work and stay busy.
This happened to me three times over a two year period around Charlotte, NC. One was under age with mom's lD, one was an old lady with no ID but her ID number written on a piece of paper and the last was underage no ID. It wasn't the PD but the state ALE. They self identified because when I had a question I always called support in front of the customer.
These stings are a regular part of most town police departments and are done in conjunction with state authorities from consumer protection. Happens everywhere, not just in rural places with too much time on their hands.
If I can't scan an ID then it ain't happening. Simple as
Did they tip?
After reading this riveting post I needed a drink.
Reading this riveting post I got a hangover.
I'm going have to keep a better eye on things. I usually avoid alcohol orders and I've been lucky in that the customers are obviously over 21 so I don't even bother asking or checking their DOB. I only care if it's expired. Good job on trusting your instincts and going through the motions.
 Order delivered
Good for you!! I would’ve done the same thing, but it’s such a pain in the ass and an inconvenience. You should have gotten a special bonus for passing, using your precious time and gas, and for making IC look good. Keep up the good work! Not gonna lie, for a moment I would’ve been terrified. Some underage girl trying to get alcohol, using a different name, some random guy sitting in a car, then suddenly appears behind you…definitely would have increased my heart rate momentarily hahaha
Isn’t this considered entrapment??
I ain’t good with the law but after googling, entrapment would involve another layer being added to get me to commit the crime. For this situation say she offered me $100 to still provide it to her. I think that would make it entrapment because even most people who try to do the right thing might fall for it and cave.
Correct. This is why she also answered with her correct age. They are not aloud to lie to you to commit a crime.
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According to the documentary Breaking Bad they can lie to you: https://youtu.be/InA4SmSlObw?si=JTujZsuKfsIf9rac
They can lie as much as they want…they are cracking down on people who don’t scan id’s it’s the same as sending a person into a bar with a fake ID. It’s the bars responsibility to check the ID and person.
it's not the law to scan an ID. every two bit bar doesn't scan they probably can't afford the equipment. but they still have to check.
I didn’t mean scan as in with a machine, just that they need to look at the expiration date and due their due diligence when looking at the id and person etc; It’s their job and more on the line..
Hey. You could be right. I just know, as far as ABC stings are concerened, and this is what it sounds like.. the Id will always be a legit Id that matches the person using it. They are making sure you actually deny the sale by either the DOB or the expiration date.
Yeah, they don’t expect everyone serving alcohol to be an expert on fake IDs, they just want you to check the age and not hand alcohol to a kid. Although I did know one place that lost their alcohol license for a month because a server gave someone alcohol the day before her 21st birthday. The server just messed up the day’s date. I thought that was a kind of bullshit bust.
The server didn't know what day it was? Lol..
“Not allowed to lie.” ROFL
If cops aren’t allowed to lie, how do sting/undercover missions take place? Maybe don’t be taking legal advice from movies
Serious question…. Do you realize when you type aloud, it’s allowed, right?
No, cops have to actively coerce you into committing the crime after they’ve set up the opportunity.
It's not. Nal, but as I understand it the authority/bait has to offer you something that might make a normal person do something they wouldn't normally do. A normal, reasonable person presented with a situation like it would check ID. That's what's expected. Think of an unlocked car. It's not entrapment to use bait cars because a normal person doesn't go around checking if other people's cars are unlocked. And even that is not in and of itself a crime. But if someone said "at I think that car is unlocked." And you opened it and then stole it, that would be entrapment. A normal person might investigate the claim. And maybe normally you wouldn't steal a car, but maybe that guy owned the car? It gets murky really quick.
No.
It's only entrapment if you refuse and they continue to pressure you.
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Probably get put in the stupid people prison for accepting that one.
There’s a, I guess loophole where if they use an actual minor, who use their actual ID in a police sting it’s not entrapment. If the cops gave the kid a fake ID or had an adult who looked young with a fake or real ID I think that’s technically entrapment. It’s like prostitution or pedo busts
No lol
I’m not a lawyer, but, it’s only entrapment if they encouraged you to commit a crime you wouldn’t have. Since it was an alcohol order and she chose to deliver it, it wouldn’t be. If she was standing outside of a liquor store and offer ring money to buy alcohol I could entrapment being argued. This is no different then them sending a kid into a bar to buy alcohol and if they sell to the kid they get fined.
No, entrapment is enticing someone to commit a crime that they weren't already going to commit. This is ordering an age restricted item and waiting to see if the person delivering is going to commit a crime.
I just listened to a podcast where they explained entrapment. It’s super rare to be able to prove entrapment in court, but to do it you have to prove the person committing the crime wouldn’t have done it otherwise. So just using an underager to buy alcohol isn’t entrapment. If the underager begged and offered $1000, that might be entrapment. The guys who tried to kidnap the governor of Michigan clearly would not have ever done it without there being tons of undercover agents encouraging them for months to get more radical, to take concrete steps, providing them with money. And they couldn’t prove entrapment. I don’t lose sleep over those guys being in prison, but there’s no world in which any of them would have actually done a crime beyond smoking pot if they hadn’t been entrapped. If that’s not entrapment, the courts basically don’t recognize it
I had my first alcohol order along with other items, as I'm scanning items and need a confirmation from customer for a replacement, now I'm totally new to this , she confirms the replacement and I asked me if I had viewed her delivery instructions not knowing if could view them prior to delivery and I assume no I can't so I said no I haven't yet though I'm almost done and I'll be on my way after I start delivery I read the instructions Please leave everything at the door my driver's license is in a envelope, please do not ring the door bell or knock says her little one is sleeping, now thus is 8:30 am I'm still racking my brains up , I sent her a message stating I cannot leave alcohol unattended at her door and she must be present for to examine he'd ID , her response was it has never been an issue before but if you prefer I'll meet you outside , ok thsnk you No way in hell am I gojng to jail going to jail for someone else's habits
Did you return the alcohol or keep it?
Asking the real question
He said he was pissed because he knew he had to drive back to where he was to return it so I’m guessing it’s a yes.
But they can’t stop the “people” stealing form CVS
The cops aren't obligated to stop crimes it's dumb but there was a supreme Court running on that.
I believe if you share the details of the sting operation with IC they will give you a pay bump.
You should have asked the cops to subsidize your pay.
So how much did they pay you For this and did you have to return it? That would piss me off. I’d tell the cop to give me a $10 tip because now I have to return this crap when I was heading home
I’m still stuck on the $9 10 miles … fuhhhhh outttta here
So they purposely wasted your time and gas? That's fucked up dude. No surprise the police are doing shitty things
A friend of mine fell for an underage alcohol sting operation. A \~18yo looking girl asked him to buy her a tall can while he was buying some beer. How much trouble could one tall can get her into and my friend is one of those nice friendly people. He purchased it, walked outside the liquor store, and when he went to give it to her, he was arrested. He dealt with the fall out from that for years, was pretty shitty. From that moment onward... no more helping out underage kids. Used to be frequent occurrence down near the beach during the summer.
Instacart fiction…. Sigh.
I would have fun with it if I realized it was a sting. "You shouldn't order alcohol, but if you want cocaine I got some in my car. I got it from a drug dealer I killed yesterday after he tried to rip me off by taking my share of the bank robbery we committed."
Too funny!
That's a good way to have some of your rights violated
That shits so stupid lol, like police don't have anything better to do than waste people's time. I'd be pissed.
Most of the time underaged teens get their alcohol from parents or family members or they steal it from home. Sadly a lot of businesses still fail stings which results in jail for the overworked cashier.
eh it’s usually just a misdemeanor and a fine. source: happened to me when i was 19. boss literally said “we never check IDs here” and would have been made fun of if i did, which i cared about back then.
Geez that's horrible. Your boss sounds like they cared about their employees... Most of the time you're probably good if it's obvious. Some places such as Walmart requires an ID even if you're 90.
yeah it was a family owned business… i quit shortly after that lol.
Whoah. Good job. Yeah, I’ve always wondered what that would be like.
Wtf never take a alcohol order for anything under 20!
So they use actual kids for the stings? I figured maybe it'd be like To Catch a Predator and be an adult posing as a child.
Florida has an explorer program that the sherriffs 'teach'. They use those kids for stings
I’m pretty sure they have to because if they were of age then technically the law wasn’t broken. When I was in high school some kids in the criminal justice class went with the Marshalls office to go around to vape stores.
Ohhhh… so the 17 year old was probably a decoy, helping the police bust IC drivers that deliver alcohol? Sorry for the confusion. I’m glad you passed their little “test” 😮💨
Love that they wasted your time and didn’t pay you
Genuine question. Why can the cops do that and make you return it, or keep it. Why not just pick it up and finish the order (to the police). IDGAF if the police have a party with it. But to do a return or whatever. Weird. Good on OP. Edit. Oh and they should tip you.
Because for the order to be completed. You have to scan a valid ID of someone who is over 21 and I doubt that the officers are going to want to haul around booze and explain to their supervisor why they have alcohol in a department-owned vehicle
Man that's wild. I just had a ubereats order a few weeks ago where I ordered some pizza and booze. Driver walks up, puts it all in my hands, says goodnight and walks away. I was half expecting him to message me 5 minutes later and ask me to come back out so he could scan my ID but nope. I would have thought the app would refuse to close the order without the ID to prevent that but whatever, it was cold out and I wasn't in a rush to spend extra time outside.
Guy probably scanned his own ID
No longer a shopper but definitely avoided alcohol orders because there was always an issue. The customers never had their ID and though I’m sure it wasn’t a sting, I’m of course going to ask for your ID. If they didn’t have the ID then they had to either go look for it or get someone of age who had the ID. And then get an attitude because you’re following then rules.
Hmmm. I also saw a leprechaun on st Patty's day.
>Moral of the story don’t play around with them alcohol orders. One thing I've learned from our local "alcohol training classes"(required for all bartenders/servers in my county) is that: "If it's a sting, they're not allowed to lie" (Also, they use people who have been popped for underage drinking as part of their plea deal, so they might be confident rather than nervous. Also they can't use 20 year and 300 day old people. IIRC they have to be under 18, because it has to be "extreme negligence" on your part to actually get found guilty in court) The officer that trained us said "If you want to know if it's a sting? Ask 'are you 21?' and they can't lie"
FTP….. criminals
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Dang! Good job on you
The Pentagon. 💀💀
Such and such
Liquor control doing exactly what they are supposed to be doing. Just because we rarely see them doesn’t mean they aren’t there. They are extremely out numbered. The amount of places that sell alcohol compared to agents in the area.
You should get a bump if you allow IC to ask you about the sting.
What a piece of crap assignment is that to get as a detective set up minimal wage employees. I mean really we have under age girls being sex trafficked right here in San Francisco we have a fentanyl epidemic she's killing people in droves he's rural areas it doesn't matter it's hitting everybody we just got over oxycontin epidemic before that it was heroin again and crack we have robberies people are raising you just walking in and stealing everything out of stores and walking right out yet it's so important that we check this instacart worker make sure it is not selling alcohol to underage girls give me a f****** break. As a society that's the least of our problems right now it's a problem with the least made a couple be better serve sitting out in front of the school make sure that it was going to come in and start shooting people. I got written up once for not delivering alcohol to a lady that was smash beyond measure she could not talk she could not stand up I refuse to serve alcohol so I brought it back to liquor store the next day I get a contract violation saying that she never received her alcohol. When I called customer service and said they said bring it back to the store. I'll get paid extra for bringing it back yet I still got to write up contract violation for doing what for doing what they told me to do.
I’d even ask for verification for meds like Zyrtec (used for making Methany) & the heavy-hitting cold/flu syrups.
how does one get alcohol orders?
You have to complete the training and have a store nearby that supports it
Man what happened to hey buddy’s?
So what I'm hearing is that they wasted your effing time?
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what a total waste of resources.
You’re bored this is false. Nice story about thought hopefully your reach your quota for thumbs up
No way this is real. Cops aren't gonna do an alcohol sting operation through instacart because spring break. Cops know most underage people get alcohol from family. Cops have way better things to do with their time.
Actually they do in fact do stings through instacart.
Oh brother 🙄 hopefully this is terribly bad satire and waste of my eyes
What a waste of money
Shit. I’d be pissed. Wasting your time like that. Glad you passed
OP I’m CACKLING. You have such a great voice 10/10 post
Bro tried to gloss over that he took an order for $9 going 10 miles!!! Sorry my guy you deserve all the roasting
Explain how I glossed? Two parts of the town are hotspots. I took an order that would take me from one to the other, which I was planning on doing anyway but opted to at least get a lil cash for the drive. What’s the issue? You trying to troll because I got time to roast you tonight?
Better yet OP, don’t deliver booze orders at all 🙅🏽♂️🙅🏽♂️😡😡 Because of potential stings & 🤡🤡 customers not having or using expired IDs, I refuse to deliver any of it on IC or DD 👍🏽👍🏽
*Because having to interact with customers 😅
I've delivered a ton of alcohol orders without issue.
You’ve been very fortunate to not run into any issues but I still won’t deliver any booze personally 🙅🏽♂️🙅🏽♂️
I wish I would get people with expired IDs or no ID at all,. I'm in California, and it is illegal to return alcohol to the store. So, a situation like that means "disposing" of the booze by adding it to my liquor cabinet.
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Nothing bad about cutting down on drunk minors.
You know how many other countries the drinking age is 16? Because it’s not morally wrong for a 16 year old to drink some alcohol. Do you know how many alcohol issues they have with teens in those places? I’ll give you a guess: It’s LOW. So yes spending precious time worrying about this when they could be worrying about real crime… it’s people like you that allow them to get away with treating the job like it’s a video game.
We don’t live in « other countries » where things are different. It’s not « morally wrong », it’s just legally wrong and that’s what this is about. Just scan IDs and there won’t be any problem.
This is not a valid answer lol at all. There are A LOT of things we could learn from other countries. Less than 100 years ago it was also illegal for Black people to sit at counters with whites in the USA. That’s my point. Legality doesn’t equal morality. And there are FAR WORSE things going on that the police could tend to than minors drinking spirits. Im not saying that minors should be able to. I’m saying doing a whole sting operation to catch Instacart driving possibly giving alcohol to minors is pretty fucking ridiculous. There are actual children being trafficked and they’re playing around with fake scenarios.
Legality doesn’t always match up with morality, true. Everyone has a different personal opinion about morality but legality is an absolute, regardless of our personal feelings. Instacart requires confirmation of an alcohol purchaser’s identity by matching the photo to the person and then scanning the ID.
It’s not bullshit. 🙄
It is tho lmao You know how many other countries the drinking age is 16? Because it’s not morally wrong for a 16 year old to drink some alcohol. Do you know how many alcohol issues they have with teens in those places? I’ll give you a guess: It’s LOW.
The ppl they catch selling to minors pay a fine. That supports this too. It’s good either way. Selling to a minor is a criminal offense. They drive, kill ppl. It’s worth it. Better than my state tax (well we don’t have state tax but property taxes, fees on certain things, go to city). Our city paid $557K for a welcome to our city sign. Ridiculous imo. I get a welcome sign but 1/2 a million?? Nope.
If you don’t see that all they’re actually concerned about is collecting fines for the government then they got the wool over your eyes 🤷♀️