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Boston bars having female troubles

Felt on Washington Street and Caprice on Tremont Street had to explain themselves to the Boston Licensing Board today over brawls involving women.

In Felt's case, board Chairwoman Nicole Murati Ferrer told bar owners they need to get a handle on why they keep having trouble with women; in Caprice's case, managers had to listen as police described a large brawl that saw women taking off their shoes and forming a fighting ring in the parking lot next door.

"You seem to be having a lot of trouble with women," Ferrer told Felt owners after police described a March 26 fight that left one woman bleeding from the back of her head where another woman smacked her with a high heel - and a bar manager nursing his own bruise from the same shoe. After that, police described an April 1 fight that started when a woman responded to a man's request to dance by throwing a hard-plastic cup at him, cutting his nose.

Ferrer said part of the answer might be getting bouncers who are better able to reject feminine wiles. "Women tend to be cuter than men" and try to use that to their advantage with bouncers, she said.

Caprice was before the board for an April 11 closing-time incident that ended with three women under arrest for assault and battery. According to police and bar officials, two groups of women were about to get into it in the bar, when bouncers escorted one group out a side door to their cars and the parking lot, and the other group out the front door. Unfortunately, bar officials said, the front-door group joined the crowds exiting the club and then into the parking lot, where they confronted the side-door group.

According to a police account, "they gathered in a large circle and began to yell and scream at each other." One detail officer tried to quell the brewing fight, but he was outnumbered. And then one woman "kicked off her shoes and began throwing punches."

The officer tried to arrest that woman, but she was flailing her arms, making it hard to cuff her. And then her sister jumped him, startling him and letting the woman escape - after elbowing him in the stomach. As reinforcements arrived, the women, many of them now barefoot, kept fighting.

Police did say bar bouncers were in the thick of it trying to quiet things down - and that without them, the disturbance could have escalated even more.

The licensing board meets Thursday to decide what punishment, if any, to mete out - although it agreed to continue one of the Felt hearings to let the bar call a detail officer who was present to explain what happened.

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Comments

What a complete scumbag Ferrer is. Can you at least pretend to feel sorry for the victim, you cancer? I thought we were rid of the attitude problem when Pokaski quit. Some things never change.

Seriously, "you have problems with women?" I'd have to think Felt's owner (whom I know personally) and management might have a bigger problem with them for having done "business" with Ferrer.

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In fact, at one point their lawyer said the owners were going to shut the place down, because of one problem after another. They didn't (and now they have a new lawyer).

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Now it's owned by Derek Brady, who also owns the Draft in Allston. I've not yet been to Felt since he purchased it, but I've certainly been in the Draft plenty of times. Never had a problem in the place. Employees are friendly and I've never seen one provoke a customer.

If somebody is a drunk (expletive), it's their fault. Make friends with people who will talk you out of trouble or drink at home.

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Assuming the ABCC approved his inclusion as an owner at a 1 p.m. hearing. But, yes, he's been heavily involved with Felt for about eight months now.

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Good work as always, Gaffin. Love what you do for the bar game.

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Great place! Good wings to boot. I was there for the grand opening a few years back.

He's a fellow UMass alumni, no? Unless the draft was recently sold.

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And not the BPD's?

The bar did the right thing, called police and kicked them out. The police then couldn't handle the situation, even with help from the bouncers.

These are 21+ year old adults, and they're responsible for their own behavior, drunk or sober.

I don't see what else is expected from a bar besides shutting them down completely. And once you do that, you'll do it to them all since rowdy assholes will just find a new spot.

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There is no Boston Police Department. Had I acquired the signatures, this would have been one of the key points of my campaign.

Cue the anonymous trash talkers.

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Glad to see the general populace still has some common sense.

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BPD issues citations whenever there is a problem at an establishment with a liquor license. It's up to the licensing board to decide whether those merit punishments, which can range from the equivalent of probation to suspending the license for a certain number of days to revoking it altogether.

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But then the licensing board grandstand anyways, even if the establishment followed proper procedure and cooperated all around.

It's exactly the reason some bars are throwing rowdy patrons out and refusing to call EMS or BPD in the first place. They know they're damned if they do, damned if they don't; and figure maybe they can get these assholes far enough away before anyone knows anything that they can disavow any association. It happened recently in a case you reported on and luckily someone spoke up to the first responders. How many times has it happened and no one knew?

That's dangerous to both the patrons, and local residents.

If the licensing board wants to stop this stuff, they need to make some reasonable suggestions and actually work with them. But the fact remains is that the establishments can't keep people away from each other once they're outside.

Kicking one group out, but not the other can help, but not if the other doesn't want to stay inside. Later closing times also would help, but fat chance with that.

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And all of them have had plenty of bar fights and the like and rarely do they get in trouble with anyone. I've asked them specifically about this after reading some of the stuff on Uhub and some of them actually liked Polaski and said he was a fair, decent guy (I've never met him).

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Is it all coming down to local politics and favors?

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"Women tend to be cuter than men" and try to use that to their advantage with bouncers,

This from the Chairwoman? Good God.

Blame the bar. God forbid you should blame the customers.

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Is anyone else getting an ad for HISCOX in the sidebar next to this thread?

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