Landmark Americana to cut hours, sell liquor license after patron’s fatal crash
Source: https://www.courierpostonline.com/
Jim Walsh
October 4, 2020
The owners of a tavern near Rowan University have agreed to sell their liquor license to settle charges arising from a fatal accident involving a drunken patron.
The operators of Landmark Americana Tap & Grill also must sharply curtail the bar’s services and pay $550,00 to the state, the Attorney General’s Office said in a statement Thursday.
The owners already had forfeited a permit that allowed them to operate a Landmark Americana on the campus of The College of New Jersey in Ewing.
That tavern closed last fall in the wake of another deadly drunk-driving crash.
The Glassboro liquor license must be sold within two years under terms of a consent order with the state Division of Alcoholic Beverage Control.
The settlement resolves charges filed by the ABC against corporate entities run by Antonio Cammarata, Fillippo Cammarata, Massimo Cammarata and David Goldman, the statement said.
It said the owners hold liquor licenses for the Ewing and Glassboro sites, as well as for WineWorks liquor store in Evesham.
The owners are not commenting on the settlement, their attorney, Lori Grifa, said Thursday.
Under the settlement, the corporations entered a plea of non vult, or no contest, to all charges against them. In turn, the ABC agreed to drop efforts to revoke the taverns’ liquor licenses.
Among other allegations, the state alleged the taverns served intoxicated patrons on three occasions – “two of which led to fatal crashes.”
A Monroe man, 21-year-old Robert Gallagher, died in a one-vehicle crash “after hours of drinking” at Landmark Glassboro in October 2019, the settlement said.
A passenger in Gallagher’s car was injured.
In December 2018, a patron who’d been drinking at Landmark Ewing, 22-year-old David Lamar of West Windsor, drove head-on into another vehicle, killing the other driver and injuring himself and multiple passengers.
Both Gallagher and Lamar had blood-alcohol levels three times the legal limit of .08 percent, the statement said.
The taverns also were accused of “operating a public nuisance requiring law enforcement responses on numerous occasions,” the statement said.
Among other restrictions, the settlement will require the Glassboro tavern to hold “last call” at 11:30 p.m., with no alcoholic beverages sold after midnight.
The Mullica Hill Road bar cannot offer amplified music, a live DJ or “coupons, tickets or tokens to redeem a free drink,” the statement says.
The settlement also resolves a charge that the operator of WineWorks failed to properly disclose an ownership interest in its license. That allegation resulted from an ABC investigation that alleged the Evesham business was transferring money “back and forth from a Pennsylvania business owned by Fillippo Cammarata,” the statement said.