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Bar brawls crackdown
A TROUBLED nightspot regularly packed with "yobbish" drunken teens has been stripped of its 3am licence after the latest in a series of violent brawls.
The Glass Works, in the borough's flagship N1 Centre, Parkfield Street, Islington, had become a notorious destination for hundreds of young revellers on Friday and Saturday nights.
But police have ordered a crackdown after more than 20 fights in the last 12 months at the "lawless" 500-capacity venue.
The final straw came when three youths were injured in a mass brawl at around 1.30am on August 22 which saw a table thrown at bar staff, one bouncer hit over the head with a glass bottle and another left with a broken arm.
Acting Chief Inspector Steve Riley, head of licensing for Islington police, said: "It started on the dance floor after one customer bumped into another. The victim was punched in the face and got a broken nose.
"There was a ruck on the dance floor as friends of both parties intervened and the place then turned into World War Three with fights all over the place. A table was thrown at the bar staff and it spilled out into the street where another male was assaulted and got a broken jaw."
At least one other youth was injured when he was hit in the head while two door staff were attacked as they tried to break up the fight. Ten police vans rushed to the scene with almost every police officer on duty in Islington that night being called into action. Acting Chief Inspector Riley said: "It took nearly all of our resources to deal with it. It's drunken yobbish behaviour. We've had 21 incidents in the last 12 months and a lot of our victims are in their late teens and early 20s."
Operators JD Wetherspoon - which runs The Glass Works as part of its Lloyds No.1 chain - have been temporarily banned from having DJs and dancing at the venue and ordered to close at midnight by an Islington Council licensing review panel.
Acting Chief Inspector Riley added: "No alcohol is being served after 11.30pm and they can only have music piped in. It was proportionate to exercise control and establish law and order, basically. JD Wetherspoon took it so seriously that the CEO attended the hearing."
A Wetherspoon spokesman said: "The company has an excellent record for the manner in which it runs its pubs, however it has fallen well below the accepted standards at The Glass Works.
"The company has been working with the police in the area to reduce the number of incidents and we are reviewing our operating procedures to ensure that similar incidents do not take place in the future. We appreciate that the police felt that they had to take the action that they have."
A spokesman for the N1 Centre declined to comment ahead of a meeting with Islington police. A final decision on future operating restrictions at The Glass Works will be taken later this month.
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