City licensing officials on Wednesday moved to shut down a southeast Denver nightclub three days after at least two people fired 66 shots during an attack that killed a 22-year-old man and wounded eight others at the club.
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Ultra Lounge East, at 9755 E. Hampden Ave., has seen three violent events on its property in the last five months, including an earlier homicide just outside the club in March, city officials wrote in an order that immediately suspended the nightclub’s liquor and entertainment licenses.
The club is required to “cease operations and close immediately,” according to the order, issued by the Department of Licensing and Consumer Protection on Wednesday.
In addition to the past violence, the nightclub was also serving food and providing hookah without the proper licenses, and the man who holds the liquor and entertainment licenses for the facility is not the man who now purports to be the owner of Ultra Lounge East, Molly Duplechian, manager of the licensing department, wrote in the order.
She alleged that the original owner of the building, Dol Bhattarai, sold or subleased the property to Dionte Wilkins, but did not transfer various licenses to Wilkins that would allow the club to operate legally.
“The department has received information indicating that Mr. Wilkins may not be eligible for a liquor license due to his criminal history, and that he has intentionally and deliberately tried to circumvent the licensing process and mislead the department by characterizing himself as a manager and not an owner,” the order reads.
It was not immediately clear what criminal history the order referred to.
Dionte Wilkins said in a text message Wednesday that he “definitely did nothing purposely,” and otherwise declined to comment.
Bhattarai told The Denver Post on Wednesday that he owns the building — where for a decade he ran the Yak and Yeti restaurant — and leased it to Wilkins about a year ago. He said Wilkins told him that he was working to transfer the liquor and entertainment licenses.
“We were trying to switch the liquor license to his name, but it was taking a long time,” Bhattarai said. “It should have been changed by now. I don’t know what happened. I am surprised.”
Bhattarai said he leased the building to Wilkins so he could slow down after 24 years in the restaurant business. Wilkins hadn’t paid rent for four months, Bhattarai said, and this week he moved to evict Wilkins from the building.
“He was telling me he would do it next month — ‘I’ll help you, I’ll bring money, my mom is going to give me money,’ he was telling me different stories,” Bhattarai said. “So that is what is taking time, otherwise I’d kick him out two months ago. I gave him a chance because I didn’t want to kick someone out right away.”
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Bhattarai said did not have any warning signs about Wilkins before giving him the lease, and he believed the man was qualified to operate the nightclub.
“I trusted him, I gave him the lease, but I feel bad about it, and I feel for the community who got damaged,” he said. (It’s) something I never expected.”
Police believe at least two shooters opened fire at Ultra Lounge East at 12:10 a.m. Monday. The two groups confronted each other earlier in the day Sunday at an event billed as a community water fight in Aurora. Police were called to several fights at that event around 7 p.m. Sunday.
That conflict reignited at the nightclub later that night when the club hosted an afterparty for the water fight. A 22-year-old man was slain; he has not been publicly identified.
Five men and three women were wounded, Denver police spokesman Jay Casillas said. The victims who were shot but survived included a 43-year-old man, two 22-year-old men, a 24-year-old man and a 24-year-old woman, a 37-year-old man, a 32-year-old woman and a 30-year-old woman, according to police.
Police recovered 66 shell casings at the scene from 45 mm and 9 mm caliber guns, according to the order, which also stated that at least one witness told police that security was lax at the venue that night and no one checked for weapons as patrons entered the club.
The order cites two instances of prior violence at Ultra Lounge East, which sits in the middle of a 1.5-mile stretch of Hampden Avenue that has seen a jump in violence so far this year. The city has seen at least five homicides and 11 nonfatal shootings along that stretch of road in the last seven months, police data shows.
In March, 47-year-old Neal Jones was beaten to death outside Ultra Lounge East. And on April 11, unlicensed security guards at the club removed a patron who was drunk and claimed to have a firearm. The security guards punched the patron in the face multiple times until he was unconscious and used pepper spray on the customer, according to the order. It was not immediately clear whether the guards were charged with a crime.
The summary suspension, which effectively shuts down the lounge, will take effect immediately, but Wilkins will have an opportunity to challenge the suspension in a hearing set for Sept. 11. A city hearing officer will listen to testimony and evidence and then issue a recommendation to Duplechian, who will issue the final decision in the case.
Summary suspensions are traditionally rare in Denver, but this action is the third time this year the city has issued summary suspensions. The city also took such action against Nativ Hotel & Gatsby Social in April, and against Vibe Smoke Shop in May.
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