(Memphis) Memphis attorney Ted Hansom, who represents Club 152, says he’ll help the owners try to re-open. A court hearing is scheduled for Monday. Hansom fears the club is a victim of its own pro-active efforts.
He said, “If two patrons decide to have a fight. The first thing the club does is notify the police is what they ought to do. Then they want to use it against them and say oh, you’ve called the police.”
Hansom says it’s Club 152’s policy to call police every time there’s a fight. He says they do it for safety reasons but believes the district attorney’s office is using that against the owners of the popular Beale Street nightclub.
“They’ve met with police directors. Club 152 has expended funds to hire off duty officers to come in and do undercover operations to try and find what was going on if there was something,” said Hansom.
Hansom says they plan to show the judge they’ve been pro-active during the upcoming hearing. It is a hearing that will come too late for the clubs 150 employees, from bartenders to waitresses, to cash in on this week’s busy BBQ
crowd.
“It’s an unjust action. It’s an action that punishes a whole lot of good people at the absolute worst time of the year,” said Hansom.
The president of the Beale Street Merchants Association also questions the timing.
Ty Agee said, “Yea, I was shocked that in the middle of the BBQ contest and the Grizzlies win the night before and everything that they would do it then. Why not do it a week before or two weeks before.”
District Attorney Amy Weirich says there is nothing to the theory this closure was timed to coincide with anything.
