Pub shut down for a crime that was committed before it existed

The owner of a Paceville pub forced to shut down by the courts has decried the injustice of being penalised for a crime committed months before he took over the venue.

“It’s completely baffling and unfair. I’m being made to pay the price for the previous owner’s mistakes,” Ronnie Axisa, who runs The Royal Oak pub in Paceville, said.

Last Thursday, the courts ordered that the establishment’s entertainment licence be revoked for one month as a penalty for having been caught allowing minors to enter the club back in January 2010. But at the time of the crime, the establishment was called Brown’s and was run by a different person altogether.

Mr Axisa only took over the venue in May 2010 – four months after the incident – renting it from the building’s owner, Bartolomew Caruana.

“When I rented the bar, Mr Caruana’s lawyer mentioned the case in passing but assured me it was nothing to worry about. I went ahead, rented the bar and refurbished it completely,” Mr Axisa explained.

It was only last Wednesday, on the eve of the case’s appeal judgement, that Mr Axisa was alerted to the imminent ruling. When it came, it left him perplexed.

“The case was against the building’s owner and concerned a previous tenant, who now lives in the UK. But I’m the one suffering the repercussions. What am I supposed to tell my staff? What do I do with all the food in our fridges?”

Mr Axisa has since filed an application against the ruling but, in the meantime, The Royal Oak’s doors remain firmly shut. In Mr Axisa’s eyes, the matter is bigger than his particular case.

“Much of the damage has already been done in my case. Regular patrons may well have moved on to other bars by the time I can reopen. But if nothing else, I want to pave the way for such cases to be dealt with differently in the future.”

It would have been fairer, Mr Axisa argued, had the court fined those responsible and recognised that The Royal Oak had nothing to do with Brown’s, the establishment guilty of the infringement.

“I give my doormen strict instructions to ensure nobody underage is allowed into The Royal Oak. If the previous owners made a mistake, I shouldn’t be the one made to pay the price for it.”