Still, I have not written about the PLCB in a decade and don't feel I can do so now without addressing this relationship. Newman is not named in the federal documents and when I was around him while he was at the PLCB – we bonded over baseball and fine wine – he always seemed extremely aware of the requirements of being a public official and careful to avoid impropriety. The PLCB was famously uninterested in wine before Newman became chairman – much storage was unrefrigerated, to give one example – and I was impressed with the way he modernized it. He was ultimately in charge of buying all the wine and spirits for the state with the sixth largest population. We met when I wrote a newspaper story about Newman who, at the PLCB, was the nation's largest wine buyer. In the late '00s, I worked in a wine business venture with Jonathan Newman, former chairman of the PLCB, after he left the organization. * And here's the clearest pay-for-play move: in the mid-2000s, a Southern supervisor gave the PLCB director of marketing a box containing $10,000 in cash in exchange for not delisting 10 Southern-distributed items from the PLCB's stores.īefore I go further in writing this story, I have to admit that it makes me uncomfortable. * A tennis bracelet worth $2500, Movado watches worth $1000, tickets to 'The Lion King' on Broadway and another $1000 in Broadway tickets to unspecified plays. Another day out included an Eagles game and adult entertainment but included no dollar figures. A $1000 restaurant bill is easier to achieve than the DOJ probably realizes, but the party also included $4000 on 'adult entertainment.' I profess no knowledge about how far $4000 goes in that arena. * A night out that included a $1000 dinner for 'a PLCB official' and others. * A ticket to the 2009 World Series, which stands out among 'multiple times a year' giving tickets to Philadelphia Eagles, Flyers and 76ers games and pro wrestling events. © NBA.com/Wikimedia | Tickets to big games were also popular bribes, along with adult entertainment packages and the old standby, cash. * An all-expenses-paid trip to Aruba, and, separately, a villa in a private resort in Jamaica. * 'Between $20,000 and $40,000 in cash.' Southern forked over so many Benjamins that it lost count.

That sounds pretty good, right? Well, there's a reason those three companies paid $4.4 million in fines combined and Southern Glazer's alone paid $5 million. A White Rock Distilleries supervisor gave the former director of marketing a check for $5000 and, a few months later, an envelope containing $5000. Breakthru Beverage gave an undeclared number of gift cards, up to $500, to the former director of marketing.

In Pennsylvania, they really love going to Florida. And Pio Imports also paid for two all-expenses-paid trips to Florida. It also paid for two trips to Scotland and a trip to Maine for a category manager, although those might actually have been work-related.

* Trips to Florida. White Rock Distilleries paid for at least eight separate all-expenses-paid trips to the Sunshine State for PLCB employees. If you want to know how big an advantage Southern Glazer's has over smaller distributors, take a comparative look at the bribes it offered.įirst, here's what the competition offered: A former director of marketing for the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board (PLCB) pled guilty to fraud in connection with the case, and faces up to 20 years in prison. Another distributor and a Maine distillery both paid $2m in fines, and a wine importer paid a $200,000 fine. Southern Glazer's, the largest wine and spirits distributor in the United States, was fined $5 million last month by the US Department of Justice for its role in a 'pay to play' scandal in Pennsylvania – paying the state's retail monopoly to carry, or not stop carrying, its wines. Southern Glazer's Accused of Fraud, Bullying The question is, how widespread are they? Related stories: We know shady dealings are going on in the wine and spirits distribution business.

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