A Leeds leisure club has applied for permission to sell alcohol, three years after it was denied a licence over police claims it was ‘a brothel’.
Applying under the name Old Crescent Cinema, but with the same address as Winston’s on Dewsbury Road in Hunslet, bosses have requested permission from Leeds City Council to serve alcohol for 16-hours-a-day.
Its managers have also asked for a licence to play music and films, as well as for indoor sporting events and dance performances.
If granted permission, those activities would all be permitted between 10am and 2am every day.
In 2017, Winston’s was denied an alcohol licence after a hearing was told by police, during a public meeting held by council licensing officers, that the premises was running as a ‘brothel’.
Police said that beds found at the club “could by no stretch of the imagination be termed massage tables”.
Winston’s strongly rejected the claims however and said there was no evidence that sexual favours were being sold there.
A barrister for the premises said then that the decision to deprive it of an alcohol licence was made on the basis of “prejudice, gossip and rumour”.
Members of the public have until Thursday, July 16, to either endorse or object to the application on the council’s website.
