The Angel Hotel pub in Denton has kept its licence after a ‘gang-related’ fight spilled out of the pub and onto the A57 carriageway during which one man was ‘glassed’ in the eye.
New managers at the pub on Hyde Road have agreed to a series of new measures - and have voluntarily closed the pub until November - in an attempt to re-brand the venue and attract a more up-market clientele.
Their new regional manager said that the company - Craft Union - would be spending £130,000 as part of a revamp to shake off the pub’s existing image.
Tameside councillors at today’s licensing meeting were largely satisfied with the proposals management had drawn up with Greater Manchester Police.
They include door staff during weekends and Manchester derbies, incident and refusal books, staff training and polycarbonate glasses for use in the beer garden.
It was GMP who originally requested the review after a fight spilled out of the pub earlier this year and culminated in one man suffering a head injury and another receiving a two-inch deep stab wound to his chest and getting ‘glassed’ in the eye.
Police had received a ‘999’ call at 2254 hours on 7 June; CCTV footage from the evening shows a ‘violent confrontation’ in the street, during which glasses from the Angel were used as weapons.
“The fight spills into the busy A57 carriageway narrowly missing a motorcycle which passes by in the direction of Hyde. Vehicles are caused to swerve and stop to avoid colliding with a number of males, who are seen to be fighting in the carriageway,” police documents sent to the licensing committee today read.
It continued across the road from the pub, close to the front door of a residential property, where a victim receives stab injuries.
“CCTV footage then shows an offender punch a bystander in an unprovoked attack, as he stood on the pavement outside the Angel Hotel holding a telephone,” the document said.
“It became clear that the incident was gang related with all parties present refusing to furnish details of what had actually occurred prior to the police arrival,” it said.
The report added that the police’s body cameras captured images of one victim, who received ‘substantial’ injuries to his eye where he had been assaulted with a glass, and ‘a 6 inch long, two inch deep laceration to his left flank believed to have been caused with a knife’.
“This male is asked about his injuries and claims to police: ‘Don’t worry about it, nothing happened mate’ the injured male continues: ‘Do I look like I’m going to bleed out?’.
“In a further conversation with police this male is heard to ask officers: ‘Is my eye hanging out?’” the police report adds.
On the same evening, police cameras also captured footage of a second victim with a head injury that the ambulance crew said appeared to have been caused by glass.
The victim also had glass injuries to his arm and ear and a stab wound to the back, the report said.
A police investigation is ongoing although neither victim has agreed to co-operate.
Police officer Martin Thorley told the licensing meeting today that there has been a history of incidents at the pub.
He said the way the premises have been managed, ‘allowing the congregation of organised crime groups to frequent the premises’ has led to incidents of alcohol and drug fuelled crime and disorder where patrons of the premises, staff and members of the public are ‘in danger of being subjected to unlawful violence.’
Further reports sent to the licensing committee by local residents describe incidents at the venue.
One person claimed that under the previous management, people had cocaine delivered to them outside the side of the pub, and that someone was chased out of the Angel with a machete and stabbed on the doorstep of an ill elderly resident.
“It is terrifying. The drug dealing is blatant and frightening. As residents we had to take eight wraps of heroin into a local police station after one of our young children found it on the car park,” they wrote.
Another detailed an occasion where ‘two women were fighting each other, pulling hair, shouting obscenities whilst in the entrance of the pub’.
One person wrote in favour of the pub keeping its licence, saying the Angel functioned as a community hub ‘where people from all walks of life are welcomed and treated as equals’.
The new management - which took over a fortnight ago - were told during today’s meeting that the pub would be allowed to remain open, providing they agreed to certain conditions.
The Angel is currently closed and will remain so until November, a choice made by Craft Union, who want to revamp the pub and make it a more upmarket destination. They are also considering changing the name in an attempt to break from the venue’s past.
In the meeting today, their solicitor Richard Taylor said he was not an ‘apologist’ for the previous manager.
“He no longer has anything to do with the premises. My client took it off him and closed it down. It’s very, very clear that this isn’t a bad pub. It’s just a pub that’s been badly run,” he said.
He added that the new managers are part of a national chain - Ei group - that runs more than 4,000 pubs around the country, with the Craft Union brand focusing on putting ‘brilliant pubs back at the heart of the local community’.
The regional manager, Mike Cotterill, added that the area manager makes two to three trips to each pub per week, while the brand would look at installing a live-in pub landlord.
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Under the new conditions - drawn up by the new management and GMP, with a few additions from Tameside council - the venue will keep an incident book and a refusal book, will implement staff training and a fully digital CCTV system, operate a challenge 25 policy and ensure that no drinks are taken outside, apart from in the beer garden where they will be put into polycarbonate cups.
Door staff will also be in place during weekend evenings, during Manchester derbies, and when Manchester clubs play Liverpool and Everton, although all these will be risk assessed.
They also agreed to liaise with GMP to find a new ‘designated premises supervisor,’ adding that the force could be given a ‘veto’ on individuals they weren’t happy with.
Licensing committee chair councillor David Sweeton said the pub is ‘obviously a problem premises that’s been very very badly run’.
“I hate to think that things like this go on in Tameside,” he said.
“We can’t have communities threatened, intimidated and frightened to death. We want people going pubs for the right reasons. Not to snort cocaine and not to do drug dealings but we need to make sure that pubs have the right managers in there to ensure that doesn’t happen.”
But he added that the new management had ‘obviously grasped’ what he had said, and was a big company that had a ‘reputation’ to get things right.
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