Stabbings and overservation allegations bring Methuselah back to the Licensing Board / iBerkshires.com

PITTSFIELD, Mass. – Methuselah Bar and Lounge was back before the Licensing Board after a stabbing outside the bar and allegations of excessive service.

On Monday, the commission continued the Methuselah hearing so the establishment and police could discuss the May 10 incident. Bar attorney William Martin said he received the police's detailed reasoning for the hearing a little more than an hour before the meeting and that a public records request was necessary for the report of that night.

“I think it’s unfair, unwarranted and inappropriate,” he said.

Police Capt. Matthew Hill said he approved the release of a police report with no reaction last week and made numerous attempts to speak to the owner, Yuki Cohen.

“I’m not trying to sandbag people,” he said.

In 2021, Methuselah was hit with a 30-day liquor license suspension after being cited for COVID-19 violations after video footage of the owner dancing without a mask atop her bar – as well as other violations – have surfaced. The establishment also faced a two-day suspension the same year and a five-day suspension in 2018.

Cohen was also fined $1,000 for COVID violations in 2020.

Board member Jon Lifergren said “history would tell us there's no reason to doubt what we're being told here.”

“I would like you to get together and decide if you want to ask them who and what, because to come before us now and have the Pittsfield police say there were people drunk, that doesn’t bode well,” a board member said. Kathy Amuso said before making a motion to table.

On Friday, May 10, around midnight, police responded to a stabbing outside the bar at 391 North St.

“Although the initial altercation that led to the stabbing took place inside Methuselah, the stabbing took place in the parking lot of the Dery Funeral Home, 54 Bradford Street, located behind Methuselah,” Hill said.

“While the incident was being investigated by the PPD Detective Bureau and patrol units, staff at the Methuselah bar told detectives, while using their body cameras, that the incident inside the bar “should all be filmed” because they have a camera system. This person informed detectives that the owner, Yuki Cohen, accesses the cameras from her phone.

Cohen then told police that her interior cameras were not recording and that she had nothing to provide, Hill reported, and that she was not present at the bar during the incident.

Last year, surveillance footage from the Tartell Gallery at the rear of the restaurant was shared with the public and analyzed by PPD after two paintings were stolen.

“I tried several times to speak to him in person about this, but was unsuccessful,” Matthew said.

“One day, while I was off duty, I spoke with a friend of mine who said he was at the bar at the time of the first incident but was not involved in the disturbance It was his opinion that the bar handled the disturbance well by immediately removing the parties involved. However, their opinion, which I agreed with, was that perhaps they should have retained half of the parties. in conflict inside rather than evicting them all at once. In this case, all parties involved simply continued and escalated this altercation right behind Methuselah, where the stabbing then took place.

During the investigation that night, two separate detectives reported to Hill that Methuselah was monitoring customers after observing several groups who were “very drunk and unstable.”

“A detective observed a customer holding another customer to keep her upright due to her apparent high intoxication,” he said.

Cohen told the Berkshire Eagle that the injured man was served a drink, but he reportedly told police he had eight drinks at the bar.

“It looks like they, for the most part, handled the altercation correctly, but serving people while intoxicated is very concerning, and we wonder if these cameras are capturing the events inside and are recorded or not,” he said. said.

“That's where we are. We're just here, mostly officially, for the drunk patrons I've detected.”

Detective Kim Bertelli-Hunt said video obtained from the funeral home showed the assault took place near Methuselah's back door.

“I followed up (the victim) the next day to see how he was, can he come and give a statement, and that's when he said he saw the article online according to which the owner said he only had one drink and that was a lie, he had eight drinks in there,” she said. .

The detective added that witnesses police spoke to were slurred, had a strong odor of alcohol, were unsteady and admitted to being “emaciated.” She spoke to six or seven people.

“One good thing I can say is they emptied the bar as soon as the incident happened,” she said.

Martin felt it was unfair that he and Cohen were not given the names of those interviewed so they could look at their tickets to see how many drinks they were served to defend themselves.

“What I am being asked to be here today to talk about, I presume, was only about the stabbings and in this letter I must strongly object to the fact that it seems to me that if you were to write a report and added, “I observed a group of other people who appeared to be intoxicated, as well as a woman who was holding another woman. It would be nice to know when it happened, where it happened and who these people are,” he said.

He said the incident did not involve any threat of violence at the bar and people were immediately asked to leave, adding the doorman did not have the authority to separate the parties.

“All he has is the power to ask them to leave. He doesn't have the power to stop them and when they left it wasn't two gentlemen arguing and threatening to do violence to themselves or were doing anything that would suggest that anyone should call the police,” Martin said.

“Neither of them had been overserved. Neither of them had made any overt threats towards the other. It was just two guys yelling at each other in a bar who were immediately asked to leave. “

President Thomas Campoli said the bar has been in business for a long time and has previously discussed cameras with the board, adding “It's a surprise to me.”

“I'm not here to pick a fight or create more conflict. I'm here to try to resolve the problem. I also agree that we need to think about cameras and videotaping. The problem “The way the cameras are out there now, they only show certain areas and that's a real problem if you have cameras that show something and not everything,” Martin said.

“And so that's a big problem because what's going to happen is you have something that's filmed and then the real action happens off camera and so it doesn't turn out to be useful. I'm not I don't disagree with that in this bar. In the environment we live in, you should probably have cameras everywhere because of that circumstance.”

He agreed to contact the police to see if they could clarify some issues.

Keywords: licensing board, stabbing,