Liverpool nightclub Cube is shut down after violen - 12th Mar 2009 4:10pm
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Liverpool nightclub Cube is shut down after violence spate
ONE of Liverpool’s newest nightspots has been shut down after being described as the most violent club in the city.
The shocking catalogue of alleged rapes, bouncers attacking drinkers, glassings and indecency inside The Cube can today be exposed.
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The Concert Steps venue opened eight months ago, but police say it is now “out of control” and akin to the notorious nightclubs of the 1990s.
A ferocious gang attack of a lone punter by up to 14 doormen, captured on CCTV, was the straw that broke the camel’s back, licensing officers insist.
Today, the ECHO can detail the spate of violent disorder which forced the authorities to close it down.
It includes:
A woman punched in the face by an unknown man and repeatedly ‘bottled’ as she lay on the floor at 2am on November 1.
The regular practice of sexually explicit comments made by male bouncers to women.
A man allegedly punched in the face at the bar by a bouncer after he accidently spilt a woman’s drink, on Boxing Day.
A woman who alleges she was raped in the toilet area of the VIP Crystal Room on January 14
A man dragged from a toilet cubicle and a teenager, 17, who alleges that she was raped. She was ejected by doorstaff.
Liverpool city councillors agreed to shut down the nightclub until a full review hearing later this month.
Sgt Paul Douglas, Merseyside Police licensing officer for Liverpool North, told the committee: “Cube is by far the worst example of licensed premises, bearing in mind it’s only been open seven months.
“It is along the lines of the premises in the 1990s which gave us lots of concerns. Cube opened in a blaze of glory, but a short time later its culinary delights were compromised into a vertical drinking environment with its classic alcohol-fuelled confrontations.”
Alleged fights and assaults have been reported to police on most weekends.
On November 9, a man required five stitches to a head gash after he accidently spilled a reveller’s drink and was punched in the face with a glass.
On February 3, a student claimed his friend was ejected by doorstaff and punched in the face, leaving him with a fractured cheekbone.
On February 11, at 3am, a woman was selling alcohol shots in the club, without authorisation, when two women bumped into her, spilling drinks.
At closing time, the trader followed the women outside and glassed them leading to the arrest and charging of the alleged attacker.
The committee also heard of an incident in January when a female police officer saw a man on the ground floor undo his jeans and expose his private parts, pressing it up against the glass window.
On November 27, a student was punched in the face by another man leaving the victim requiring stitches.
The injured man was ejected and given £10 to get a taxi to hospital as a woman was seen mopping up the blood from the floor.
On October 19, at 1am, three women were dancing upstairs in the club when they were subject to an unprovoked assault, leaving all of them with facial injuries.
A solicitor representing Cube argued that they disputed many versions of the disorder put forward by Merseyside Police.
A spokesman said they had no knowledge of some of the incidents.
Others, like one of the alleged rapes, was a male and female indulging in a consensual sex act, the spokesman said.
Last May, the ECHO revealed how a bid to run Cube by former Premiership footballer Alan Rogers, formerly of Nottingham Forest and Tranmere, was blocked by police.
It followed a chance conversation with career criminal Colin Fitzgibbon who spoke of having a “monetary interest” in the soon-to-be-opened city centre venue.
THE ECHO
Sorry Dan