By James Haynes, The Daily Item of Lynn (Massachusetts)
LYNN, Mass. - City licensing officials voted unanimously to revoke all licenses of the Buchanan Cafe, where an off-duty Lynn police officer was attacked last week, calling the bar a “constant nuisance,” and the attack a “rotten shame.”
Members of the Licensing Commission heard testimony from police officers, witnesses, and both the owner and employees of the bar, during an emergency hearing Tuesday, called in the wake of an assault on Lynn Police Lt. Vernon Coleman last Wednesday.
Coleman was eating at the bar, located at the intersection of Eastern and Western avenues, when he was allegedly struck from behind, and subsequently punched and kicked by James Costin. Costin, an alleged Hells Angel and state auditor, is being held without bail pending a dangerousness hearing this morning.
Attorney David Woods, representing the bar, offered an apology to Coleman, and stressed a commitment to cooperation in ongoing investigations. In a failed bid for clemency, he conceded that employees failed to follow established policies for contacting police following brawls.
“We aren’t looking to be exonerated for that,” said Wood. “We are just asking not to be executed for it.”
Commission members, however, saw serious flaws in employee response to the incident, and criticized bar-owner Sheila Casey’s decision to schedule only one employee, her son Tyler Casey, a self-described occasional and untrained bartender, to oversee the establishment on one of the busiest nights of the year.
“With the lack of control on the premises, it’s a miracle something more serious hasn’t happened,” said commission chairman Richard Coppinger. “It is a danger to public safety and a drain on the resources of this city.”
Lynn Police officer Edward Pettipas told commissioners the bar, although empty when he arrived, was busy and likely extremely crowded Wednesday, with between 30 and 35 customers drinking in the bar. He also reported Tyler Casey, the only employee apparently working Wednesday night, did not call for either police or ambulance.
Casey told commissioners that a patron had told him that the police had been called. The patron, who also works at the café, had been outside at the time of the fight, speaking on the phone with Sheila Casey. Sheila Casey told police she had called their main number to report the incident.
Police played three recording of calls to 911 and the main number regarding the fight. Casey testified she was the second caller; her call came in approximately one minute after the first, in which a neighbor told police "(The patrons) are going nuts.”
Coleman’s girlfriend also gave testimony to the commission. Still visibly shaken by the experience, she told commissioners that bar employees did not assist Coleman, and alleged that bartender Tyler Casey was behind the bar throughout the assault.
“The whole time I was in the bar, he was behind the bar,” said Coleman’s girlfriend, who also told police Casey had told her he would not call police because he wasn’t aware a fight had occurred.
Casey, when questioned by the commissioners, disagreed, maintaining that he was in a back room swapping out liquor bottles when Coleman was attacked.
“I definitely did not say those things to her,” he said. “That is definitely incorrect.”
Casey acknowledged, in retrospect, that he did not have control of the bar on Wednesday. An occasional bartender at his mother’s establishment, he estimated he had been tending bar for about a year, only worked one or two nights a week and had not undergone TIPS training. He also testified that he recognized, but did not know Costin, co-defendant Thomas Duda Jr., and a third as-yet unidentified suspect.
"(They have been in) a few times,” he said. “But I don’t know them, I don’t know their names.”
Sheila Casey told commissioners that she had been ill for two weeks prior to the incident, and was sick in bed at the time of the fight. She admitted she had not called for medical attention after calling police, but testified it was not her policy to have employees call her before calling police.
Coppinger called her sharply to task for understaffing the bar.
“You believed one employee, under the best of circumstances, was sufficient to keep control of the establishment?” he asked. “I strongly disagree. You had no control of the premises at all, and I think that’s the root of the problem here.”
Casey declined comment following the commission’s ruling. When asked if she planned to appeal the decision, Wood responded “absolutely not.”
The hearing attracted several city councilors, and numerous police officers. Police Chief John Suslak said he was pleased with the outcome.
“I think the commission has been very supportive, and they understand full well the importance of public safety in the city,” he said.