A former Virginia Alcoholic Beverage Control Authority employee pleaded guilty to a felony computer trespassing charge after he was implicated in an unusual scheme to sell agency inventory data to buyers looking for early intel on which stores would have hard-to-find bottles of bourbon, ABC officials announced Monday.

Edgar Smith Garcia, 28, of Manassas, received a suspended sentence of two years in prison after entering the guilty plea in Hanover County Circuit Court. The two-year sentence was suspended for five years, meaning Garcia, who worked for ABC as a lead sales associate from early 2020 until March, can avoid prison time for good behavior. He is also banned from ABC property and has to pay a $600 fine.

Three other embezzlement and conspiracy charges were dropped as part of the plea deal.

In the search for hard-to-find bottles of bourbon at Virginia ABC stores, some liquor enthusiasts have been worried about leaks of a more serious kind. Employees of the government-run liquor monopoly would have access to highly valuable inside information about which products were going where, and the system could lead to some buyers getting tipped … Continue reading

The alleged scheme came to light after numerous bourbon collectors raised concerns that some buyers seemed to have a heads up about which stores would be selling rare bottles that aren’t normally available at the state’s government-run liquor stores. That trend frustrated many collectors, who felt they weren’t...

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