Club Owner: Downtown A Violent Area

By Tak Landrockt.landrock@krdo.com

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COLORADO SPRINGS – For the third time in a month, Colorado Springs police have been called to 13 Pure to investigate a violent crime. The latest incident happened Sunday morning after a shootout in the alley near the club.The owner, Michael Laughlin, tells NEWSCHANNEL 13 that his staff takes security seriously, but also blames the atmosphere of the city. “I see things escalate much faster here; this city has gained a lot of national attention for all the homicides that are coming from soldiers with post traumatic stress disorder.”Laughlin, who’s owned clubs all around the country including a strip club in Miami, Florida, says the crime here is unlike anywhere else. “In my 23 years worth in business, working all over the country, this is one of the most gratuitously violent towns I’ve been in.”

He says his staff pats down everyone who enters the club and even uses a hand held metal detector to make sure no one comes into the club with a weapon. “It’s is very wild, wild west. I don’t want to say it’s hard to control, but how do you forecast a shooting that doesn’t happen inside the establishment or have anything to do with the establishment?”

He argues that most of the crimes reported by the media happens outside his club, sometimes several blocks away. “The person involved in [Saturday’s] shooting had not been in the club, never tried to come into the club, wasn’t in front of the club; this is an incident that happened in the alleyway,” says Laughlin.

Laughlin says it was a patron inside the club that alerted them to the man in the alley, and club staff promptly called 9-1-1. “Within 30 seconds; they started shooting, and the cops were right there.”

Over the last month 13 Pure has had several violent crimes make news headlines. In the beginning of December, one man was arrested for allegedly threatening a bouncer with a knife.Just a week earlier, two men were stabbed outside the club.

Laughlin, who does live in Colorado Springs, is trying to sell the club for $2.8 million dollars. He tells NEWSCHANNEL 13 that it has been on the market for six months and he does have some offers.

Next week the club plans to change its name, a move the owner says has nothing to do with the recent violent crimes.