The Los Angeles City Council voted Wednesday to revoke the permit of a Hollywood nightclub where a fight broke out last year, leading to the death of a disc jockey.
The council voted to revoke the conditional use permit of the Cashmere nightclub, which goes by the name “The Day After,” at Hollywood Boulevard and North McCadden Place.
Such permits require that businesses follow rules regarding hours of operation, restrictions related to the age of patrons, the sale of alcohol and food, capacity and promotion activity.
City Councilman Mitch O’Farrell, who represents the Hollywood area, pointed to a string of criminal activity and land-use violations that have plagued the nightclub as reasons for the revocation.
The club has allowed the sale of alcohol to minors, and police are investigating the alleged sexual assault of a female college student at the club in 2014, according to O’Farrell.
Last August, Jose Silva-Nieves, a disc jockey known as DJ Steez, was beaten into a coma during a fight that began inside the nightclub. He was later declared brain dead at a hospital.
Cashmere’s permit revocation gives law enforcement the power to shut down the club immediately, if the operators do not do so themselves.
O’Farrell said other club operators who flout city rules should expect a similar response from the city.
“The incidents at Cashmere presented the city with an opportunity to streamline the process of bringing rogue nightclubs into compliance,” O’Farrell said.
He said his office has teamed with the City Attorney’s Office, Police, Building and Safety and Fire departments and Alcohol & Beverage Control “to make sure scofflaw clubs like Cashmere comply with city permits.”
If clubs fail to meet the city’s requirements, “we will shut down them down as expeditiously as possible, so nothing like this can happen again,” O’Farrell said. “Let this send a strong message.”
—City News Service