Garden Grove : Council Rejects Plan to Reopen Sin Not Bar

The City Council has turned down an appeal by the owner of the Sin Not bar to reopen the Buena Clinton tavern, which was closed in August after police testified that it served as a “focal point” for drug and prostitution activity in the area.

Owner Ezra Joseph had hoped to keep the bar open until his lease expires Dec. 31, but the City Council rejected that plan at its Monday meeting. Joseph’s attorney, Jerome Stark, said he would file a claim for damages with the city and, if it is denied, follow with a lawsuit. He estimated his client’s losses at about $40,000 in lease payments and investments in the bar.

At a hearing in July, police testified that undercover officers purchased heroin at the bar at least 10 times during a recent narcotics operation. In addition, police said, there were about five times the average number of calls for police as at other city bars and 10 arrests stemming from shootings, stabbings and one rape since January, 1982.

Stark said the number of calls are misleading because Joseph had told his employees to call police at the slightest sign of trouble at the request of the police. “It’s kind of a Catch-22,” Stark said.

Sgt. Mike Walker, who heads a six-man patrol unit assigned to Buena Clinton, said there were only four calls for service in September from the retail shops next to the closed bar at Westminster Avenue and Clinton Street and no increase in calls within the neighboring residential area.

Monday’s City Council decision was delayed for about two hours because Joseph, who faces misdemeanor charges for allowing minors in the bar, would not appear before the council because he feared he might be arrested on a third such charge, said Stark. The attorney summoned his client after checking with police to be sure he wouldn’t be arrested. “We had no intention of arresting him,” said Sgt. Pat Thrasher.