Beer lovers frothing with anger after police seize ‘unlicensed’ beers in raids on Philly bars

Beer lovers froth with anger over Philly bar raids

PHILADELPHIA — A real brew-haha has beer lovers in the City of Brotherly love frothing over with anger.

To one side, the uproar is borne out of typographical errors, hard-to-spell beer names and archaic, Prohibition-era liquor laws. To the other, it’s a simple matter of making sure bars and beer manufacturers aren’t scamming the system.

It all came to a head after a tipster complained that a Philadelphia bar was selling beer that had not been properly licensed with the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board. That agency was created after Prohibition in 1933 to regulate the sale of alcohol.

The tip led to raids last week at three upscale bars. Police confiscated three quarter-kegs and 317 bottles of beer that were believed to have not been properly registered with the state.