The usual Thursday-night karaoke crowd at Ghost Pepper Taqueria on Savin Hill Avenue swelled on April 16 with the addition of two large birthday parties. And as the place let out for the night, now early on the 17th, people were in no mood to leave. But they were in a fighty mood, not a mood to burst into more song, according to a police report read into the record at a Boston Licensing Board hearing on Tuesday.
Officers responding to a call for a “disturbance” around 12:50 a.m. were updated on their way by the dispatcher that “people had just gotten out of the bar and were making noise and kicking things,” BPD Sgt. Det. William Gallagher said:
“Officers could see several scattered groups with about five to ten people in each group loitering and being loud, located between the intersection of Savin Hill Avenue and Tuttle Street up to 127 Savin Hill Ave, Ghost Pepper Restaurant. Upon arrival, officers observed several double-packed motor vehicles idling in front of 127.”
The officers pulled up and at first sat there, just monitoring the crowd emptying out of Ghost Pepper, many of them continuing to add to the din, and appearing to be “extremely intoxicated,” he continued.
“As the crowd grew larger, about 100 people, officers observed a few fights nearly break out between some of the females who were on scene. Officers quickly turned on their bright white takedown lights, along with the mounted vehicle spotlight, got on the loud intercom speaker, and advised the crowd to knock it off and begin to disperse.”
Some did, but others refused to budge. The officers radioed for additional help from other District C-11 officers, and finally, the large angry crowd began to disperse. Later that day, a C-11 sergeant returned to issue a citation for “failure to disperse patrons,” which led to today’s hearing.
Ghost Pepper co-owner Driscoll DoCanto said what happened that night was “just a one-off,” that karaoke doesn’t usually need a firm hand in ending the night. He said the restaurant, next to the Savin Bar + Grill he also co-owns, doesn’t even have bouncers on hand to quell disturbances, there just hasn’t been a need.
Still, he said, because of the incident Ghost Pepper now ends karaoke night at 11 p.m. rather than the singing-until-midnight schedule before April.
He added he shut down Thursday-night karaoke completely for several weeks after the incident “just to kind of reset the table with with the crowd that tends to come.”
He said there have been no similar recurrences since.
The board decides Thursday whether Ghost Pepper could have foreseen what happened and done anything to prevent it, and, if so, whether any sort of sanction is needed.
