ROARING FORK BROADCASTING COMPANY
Operators of an Aspen nightclub recently agreed to pay a $10,000 fine for serving alcohol to minors as part of an incident that’s had communitywide reverberations.
A show cause hearing set for Friday (Sept. 13) for The Sterling Aspen was canceled after its ownership agreed to pay the penalty as part of a stipulation with the city that the Local Licensing Authority authorized earlier this month. The City Attorney’s Office also dropped charges that a Sterling doorman accepted cash bribes to admit the minors into the lounge.
Video evidence showing the minors interacting with the doorman debunked the bribe allegation, a lawyer representing Sterling told members of the Local Licensing Authority at their Sept. 3 meeting. The agreement came after the city cited Sterling’s parent company, Joonas Group LLC, after three minors told police they used fake IDs to enter the nightclub on March 15, according to an arrest warrant affidavit filed by an Aspen Police Department officer.
It was not long after their visit to Sterling, during the early morning hours of March 16, when the three passengers abandoned a Ford 150 truck on South 3rd Street between West Main Street and West Hopkins Avenue. Moments earlier, police had been pursuing the truck, allegedly driven by a then-assistant boys basketball coach at Aspen High School, Christopher Woodring, for moving violations in the West End neighborhood, according to the affidavit.
Authorities arrested Woodring, who allegedly told the passengers to take off when he ditched the truck, the next morning at his home in Snowmass Village.
Woodring no longer coaches at the high school. He has not entered a plea to a class 5 felony eluding charge, a class 1 misdemeanor charge of contributing to the delinquency of a minor and a driving-under-the-influence charge.
According to court records, an arraignment hearing scheduled for last Friday was rescheduled to Nov. 4. Woodring’s lawyer, Heather Cramer, has asked for and received seven hearing continuances since the first arraignment hearing scheduled May 20, court records show.
The three underage passengers, which included a 17-year-old juvenile and a 19- and 20-year-old male, were each charged with a petty offense of minor-in-possession.
In the Sterling matter, meanwhile, a City Attorney’s Office representative at the LLA meeting said the penalty was consistent with those more recently levied on Aspen establishments for violating liquor laws — one for serving minors, another for serving during after-business hours.
Mi Chola, for instance, settled with the city for $10,000 after it over-served one patron and served a minor on unrelated occasions in February 2023. A portion of Sterling’s fine will go toward a nonprofit organization in line with the LLA’s mission of public education and awareness regarding serving and drinking alcohol.
“To be clear, how we reached this situation was after reviewing similar instances, for example, Mi Chola, who had a serving-under-21 incident and also (Aspen) Public House, for serving past the time you’re allowed to be serving. These conditions (placed on Sterling) were appropriate to continue to treat people fairly and the idea is they should be treated the same as other restaurants with similar issues,” said Luisa Berne, assistant city attorney.
The settlement agreement entailed Sterling pleading no contest to two of three counts alleging serving alcohol to minors. A third count for serving a minor was dropped, according to city records.
The agreement also defers a seven-day suspension of Sterling’s liquor license for six months. If the lounge stays clean during that period, the suspension will be dropped.
The City Attorney’s Office switched from the position it held in June, when it received LLA approval to conduct a show cause hearing for owners and operators of Sterling to demonstrate why the nightclub’s liquor license “should not be revoked or suspended or other disciplinary action taken” in light of the charges.
A motion to show cause by the City Attorney’s Office said the three minors told Aspen police “that they presented fake IDs to the doorman along with cash, ranging anywhere from $20-$50 bills, and were allowed into the establishment, even though the doorman advised two of three that he knew the IDs were not legitimate.”
Further examination showed a bribe didn’t happen, Bryan said.
“What the video did show is not what was alleged in the complaint,” Bryan said, “and I think that’s one reason that the city changed its position on these allegations. There was not a bribe. There was no evidence of the bribe. The only people that have said that they bribed their way in were the three people under the age of 21 who admitted to the police that they used fake IDs, and they lied about bribing the doorman.”
Joonas Group LLC holds a restaurant and tavern license allowing both Sterling and the adjacent Bear Den to serve alcohol. Both establishments operate at 301 E. Hopkins Ave. and though they have mutual ownership, they operate independently from each other.
Bryan told members of the LLA that the liquor license Joonas Group holds for two separately run operations will likely be severed, citing a future scenario where “if one of them has any trouble, that doesn’t affect the other one.”
The three LLA members attending the meeting earlier this month approved the stipulation by a 2-1 vote. Member Amos Underwood cast the dissenting vote; Underwood indicated he wanted more scrutiny into the corporate structure of Joonas Group and Sterling bar operator Andrew Sandler’s level of involvement. Sandler has butted heads with the city in the past, but Bryan said Sandler’s current role had been made clear to the city and the operation was above board.
“Because there is a party to one of the LLCs that has had prior violations, that doesn’t mean that this licensee has had prior violations,” Bryan said.
Sandler is not a member of Joonas Group but he is a member of Sterling Aspen LLC, which owns 49% of Joonas Group.