MIDDLEBORO — On Dec. 16, a nineteen-year-old man entered 24 Middleboro retailers that sell tobacco products as part of a compliance check. Fourteen of the 24 establishments sold him a tobacco product.

Those 14 businesses were hit with a $1,000 fine on Monday, Jan. 8, after the Middleboro Select Board, acting as the board of health, voted unanimously to apply the fine. The $1,000 fine represents the penalty in Massachusetts for first time offenders of the sale of a tobacco product to a person under the age of 21. 

According to Middleboro Health Agent Kayla Smith, the town hired a private company to complete the compliance check.

“This company is run by Bob Collett, who used to do compliance checks through the state,” said Smith. “When the state took away his funding, he started running his own company for tobacco checks.”

The 14 retailers who were fined are EVRO, Inc., Jamie’s Liquors, Capeway Convenience, DBG Village, Inc., Freitas Liquors, Stop & Save, K&K Smoke Shop, AL Prime, Gas Depot, Middleboro Shell, Middleboro Discount Liquors, Middleborough Mart, Middleboro Petroleum and Ron’s Geko.

The second violation in a 36-month period for selling tobacco to a person under the age of 21 in Massachusetts will result in a fine of $2,000 and a suspension of a license to sell tobacco products for seven days.

Tony Freitas, who owns Freitas Liquors, said that his business doesn’t sell tobacco to underaged customers purposely. Freitas apologized, and said that he thinks the fine for first offenders is “steep”.

Select Board member Thomas White responded, saying he was aware that Freitas Liquors had never had an infraction, but noted that the fine comes from the state of Massachusetts rather than the town.

“I do sympathize with you folks, I don’t think any of you did this deliberately,” said Select Board member Neil Rosenthal to the business owners in attendance. “You’re just going to have to be much more watchful in the future because we have no choice but to uphold these rules.”

Kostas Geroukos, who owns Ron’s Geko, requested more information about the sale in which the violation occurred.

“I have no idea of knowing [which employees] are doing a great job and who’s not doing a great job,” said Geroukos, who also said he conducts his own compliance tests within his store. “It isn’t fair for us, the owners, to have just this letter and no other information about it.”

Smith said that specific information about the time of the sale must be requested from the town and noted that eight of the 14 retailers fined had already requested more information.