Navy Yard Gay Bar Fined $3K for Not Preventing Slashing
The 8th Street SE gay bar The Bachelor’s Mill has been fined $3,000 for improperly handling an assault this winter that led to a brutal slashing.
The District’s Alcohol Beverage Regulation Administration ruled on Thursday that the club failed to protect the victim of a Feb. 2 attack by not following its security plan and allowing the establishment to be used for an “unlawful or disorderly purpose.”
Terrill Terry, 22, hit an acquaintance in the head with a beer bottle on one of the bar’s dance floors about 2:15 a.m. Sunday, Feb. 2, police said, according to ABRA’s report.
Terry and the 34-year-old victim then left the 1104 8th St. SE bar, and the victim told police that bar security ignored his report of the assault.
Moments later, on the 1100 block of 7th Street SE, Terry slashed the man’s face, neck and wrist with a box cutter, leaving him bleeding profusely, police said.
After the beer bottle attack, club staff should have directed Terry to the manager’s office or a “designated cooling area,” and put the victim in his car or in a cab, ABRA ruled.
Witnesses told police that Terry believed the victim had been making advances toward someone Terry described as his “husband,” Washington Blade reported.
The Bachelor’s Mill, which calls itself one of the oldest gay bars in the city, has often attracted complaints about noise and disorder, ANC 6B commissioner Kirsten Oldenburg said.
Locals are especially bothered by crowds that spill out onto the street when the club closes at 3 a.m. on its busiest nights, Thursday and Saturday.
“I have worked over and over with management, but nothing seems to help with the central problem of when the place closes on Thursday and Saturday nights,” Oldenburg wrote in an email.
Relatively few homes are located near the club now, but apartments are slated to open at 7th and L streets SE, and 816 Potomac Ave. SE is being renovated with new condos.
Court records show Terry — a La Plata, Maryland resident charged with armed assault with intent to kill — was released on bond in April on the conditions that he stay away from DC except for work or court, stay away from The Bachelor’s Mill and refrain from drinking alcohol. The case is ongoing.
Bachelor’s Mill staff did not immediately respond to an inquiry.
The Feb. 2 attack occurred just blocks from where Marine Michael Poth fatally stabbed fellow Marine Philip Bushong on April 21, 2012. Poth killed Bushong, 23, on the 700 block of Eighth Street SE. He was sentenced to 11 years in prison after being convicted of voluntary manslaughter in December 2013.
