Time for a discussion.. What do we think of this story?
Parents Arrested for Hosting Booze NYE Party for Teens Do you agree that the parents should have been arrested for hosting this party?
Do you think the Westchester County DA is being more than a little harsh?
Was it better that the kids were drinking in a safe environment? Or do you think breaking the law is breaking the law - period
Ready .. Set ... Go!
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Hmm dont know if the link is working. Here is article:
Mom & Pop booze bash for teens DA drills Scarsdale dentist and wife who hosted New Year's eve drinking party for daughter and 50 pals
Prominent Westchester dentist Paul Taxin and wife face up to year in jail if convicted on the charge of unlawfully dealing with a child.
A tony Westchester County town has been rocked by the arrest of a prominent dentist and his wife for hosting a booze-soaked New Year's Eve bash for almost 50 underage high schoolers.
And while law enforcement officials expressed horror that Paul and Christine Taxin would turn their million-dollar Scarsdale home into a speakeasy for their teenage daughter and her friends, students - and even some parents - have rushed to the couple's defense and denounced their arrest.
'It's ridiculous for those parents to get in this much trouble,' said Jon Soloff, 17, an Ardsley High School senior who was at the controversial party, held among grand homes with gracious, well-kept lawns.
'It was New Year's Eve,' he said. 'The police are lucky it was in a house with parents and not in cars or in a park.'
That argument was angrily rebutted yesterday by Westchester District Attorney Jeanine Pirro, who charged the couple with first-degree unlawful dealing with a child, a misdemeanor punishable by up to a year in jail.
'This is unacceptable and illegal and a complete abrogation of parental responsibility,' Pirro raged. 'They ignored the often fatal consequences of underage drinking, which will simply not be tolerated.'
The controversy began when local police received a 911 call saying a group of beer-swilling teenagers had spilled out of the Taxins' three-story Hidden Glen Road home and were loudly celebrating along the cul-de-sac just before 11 p.m., Town of Greenburgh Police Chief John Kapica said.
The officers first spotted two 16-year-old boys downing beers outside, and the teens quickly pointed to the front door of the Taxins' boxy, modern split-level as the source of their illegal brews.
Paul Taxin, 48, a prominent New Rochelle dentist, let in the officers, who spied dozens of beer cans and hard liquor bottles in the hands of partygoers, all of whom were under 21, Kapica said.
'The couple admitted that they knew that the teenagers were drinking alcohol at their party downstairs,' Kapica said. 'It was a chaotic scene, and we're fortunate that no one had gotten hurt.'
Christine Taxin, 52, explained to police that she and her husband thought it was safer for her daughter and her friends to be drinking at home than elsewhere, authorities said.
'Underage drinking anywhere leads to assaults, rapes and traffic deaths,' said Pirro.
She said the arrest was part of a crackdown on underage drinking parties like the high-profile September 2001 bust of a Chappaqua couple who supplied a stripper for their teenage son's party.
'We've got to prioritize turning off the supply of alcohol to minors,' Pirro said.
None of the teens - the majority of whom were believed to be drinking, Pirro said - was arrested, but all were forced to stay at the Taxins' home until their parents picked them up. Investigators will interview them this week to determine who bought the booze.
Paul Taxin, who was arraigned with his wife Tuesday and is due back in court Feb. 8, was back at his dental office and declined comment yesterday.
His neighbors, however, were torn about the sudsy scandal that was the talk of the street, still littered with empty Bud Light cans yesterday.
'If they were serving liquor to them as minors, then that's 100% wrong, especially with the dangers of drinking and driving,' said Bob Guerrerio, 42, who lives two doors down.
Not everyone agreed, a point underscored by one teenage girl who leaned out the window of a sport-utility vehicle and whooped while flashing a bottle of Grey Goose vodka as it drove by the Taxins' house, which is in the Ardsley school district.
'It was under control the whole time,' said partygoer Lauren Herzog, 17, a junior at Ardsley High.
The school district's superintendent, Richard Maurer, said yesterday he would not discipline any students because the drinking did not happen on school grounds.
'Parents knew there was going to be alcohol at that party,' said Joe Jordan, 58, whose own teenage children did not attend the Taxin bash. '[Parents] shouldn't send their kids if they were worried there was going to be alcohol.'
