Top cop wants to padlock Suite Ultralounge
After more than a year of debate, a failed effort by the liquor board and contant complaints by residents of Mid-Town Belvedere and Mount Vernon, Baltimore's police commissioner has issued a padlock order to Suite Ultralounge.
This bottle club has been a constant irritant for residents and defended by its owner and lawyer as a victim of misplaced community outrage. They say violence outside the club but attributed to patrons unfairly demonizes the nightspot that attracts teens.
The debate over crime outside Ultralounge grew into a citywide debate over crime downtown at aother nightclubs and led to talk about whether the city was safe at night. Police have been using the padlock law to hold bar and liquor store owners more accountable and have forced several to close or revise their security plans.
A double shooting and stabbing that police say began as disputes inside the club on East Chase Street, in the basement of the historic Belvedere hotel, are just the most public. Police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi gave some more examples:
-- 17-year-old patron held up at gunpoint at 12:58 a.m. on Jan. 18 outside the club, beaten and robbed of money and a cell phone.
-- A 15-year-old patron who robbed two 15-year-old male patrons at gunpoint as they left the club on Feb. 1
-- A male patron who was stabbed near the club and suffered life-threatening injuries on Oct. 11, which prompted a retaliatory shooting that left a female with a through and through gunshot wound to the thigh that same night. Police said the dispute started inside the club.
“The reality is there is no question you can tie a number of violent offenses to this club,” said City Councilman William H. Cole IV. “Whether or not the liquor board does what it needs to do, the city has its own tools it can use in the most egregious cases. The entire community has been begging for this for well over a year now.”
The attorney for the club, Peter A. Prevas, didn't return a call I made to his office this afternoon.
Categories: Confronting crime, Neighborhoods
Comments
We used to eat dinner at the Owl Bar after attending Saturday night concerts at the BSO, because it was one of the few close restaurants that served late. I will not take my mother there after concerts anymore because of all the ruckus in the streets when Suite Ultralounge lets out on Saturday nights.
Perhaps I'm a wimp, but when the streets are full of young people and cops have closed off Chase Street to traffic, I don't want my elderly mother anywhere near there.
Posted by: B'More Cat Lover | October 21, 2009 10:54 AM
So it is closed for good? I'm confused as to what this means.
Posted by: cjohns | October 21, 2009 3:33 PM
Sorry, a graf got dropped. The padlock order is posted and a hearing is scheduled for Nov. 16 at police headquarters. After hearing evidence from both sides, a hearing officer can then order the club closed for up to a year.
Posted by: Peter Hermann | October 21, 2009 3:38 PM
why is a freakin teenage, wannabe thug hangout in the arts district anyway?
Posted by: keith | October 21, 2009 8:45 PM
As someone who lives two blocks away from the Belvedere, I can say without a doubt that padlocking the Suite Ultralounge may not completely solve crime in Mt. Vernon, but it will certainly diminish the frequency of assaults and groups of teenagers accosting residents each weekend.
It's sad that every weekend the police have to close down Chase Street and one or two police choppers need to patrol the neighborhood. Odd that this was never an issue before the bottle club opened....
Posted by: kungpow | October 22, 2009 10:36 PM