Downtown Bar Ejects ID-Less 91-Year-Old

Photo by FrayLo

Sunday, the Times' Danny Westneat had the story of 91-year-old Rose Walter, who was ejected from Von's Cafe on Pike in December because she didn't have her ID.

Rose manages an apartment building on Lower Queen Anne--the very apartment building, in fact, that our sister lived in until last summer.

She (Rose) is just about the sweetest lady you can imagine, and we provide this anecdote as evidence: Our sister owns a large rottweiler mix--name of Riley. She was hoping to find a landlord who'd let her keep him when she moved.

To this end, she asked Rose to write a letter attesting to Riley's deportment. Not a day later, said letter arrived under sister's door, describing an angel of a dog and, touchingly, in that "grandma" style of handwriting we're sure you're all familiar with.

Anyhoo, this is the quality of person that endured the ignominy of being tossed out of Von's.

The mgmt. blames draconian city enforcement of liquor laws. Manager Greg Galuska told Westneat: "Obviously you have heard what's going on downtown lately, with the mayor and the Police Department and the liquor board. They've blatantly put out an agenda that they're going to penalize bar operators. We decided that to protect ourselves in this environment, we had to move to 100 percent ID compliance. No exceptions. It's not worth risking imprisonment on the part of me or my staff."

Indeed, as Dominic Holden reports in this week's Stranger, bouncers and bartenders caught in a 2007 city sting were offered jail time as a plea bargain and are therefore fighting the charges in court.

Jessica Riley, an attorney representing one of the defendants, tells Holden: "A 20-day jail recommendation is an unreasonable offer in light of the nature of the offense and his lack of criminal history."

Hey--we went to elementary school with Jessica Riley! Who shares a name with our sister's dog! This story gets more and more coincidentally up in our grill every second, so we're going to stop delving into things now before we find out we have a 6pm shift at Von's tonight.