With the collapse of talks to redevelop the controversial Jackhammer nightclub, the owner of the club and the Village of Schaumburg are heading back to court to continue their legal fight.
Downtown Restaurants Inc., Palatine, last week withdrew its offer to redevelop Jackhammer, 1450 E. Algonquin Rd., Schaumburg.
The club, the scene of a 1994 drive-by shooting and the alleged target of numerous police calls, had its business license revoked by the village last April. Owner Lou Owen got a court stay of the revocation until the case was reviewed.
“I’ve been working on the project for over a year . . . (but) we weren’t able to come to terms,” said Dan Heuertz, partner in Downtown Restaurants, which owns the Mia Cucina restaurant in Palatine, Spasso Italian restaurant in Wauconda and Terzo Grille in Park Ridge.
“We couldn’t put together a deal that worked for both sides,” said Crystal Lake attorney Kevin O’Brien, whom Owen retained to negotiate a management contract with Downtown Restaurants.
O’Brien said Owen has not indicated if she has any alternate development plans.
Village Planning Director Frank Robbins said his staff thought Downtown Restaurants was “a good outfit.”
“We were ready to recommend them to the Village Board,” he said. “We thought they would have several restaurants, continue to maintain the banquet facility and have a live music venue.”
Former Village Manager George Longmeyer, in a report to trustees at the license revocation hearing in April, said Jackhammer was operated “in a manner not conducive to public health, safety and morals.”
Longmeyer noted that two of the club’s security guards were arrested in February 1997 for carrying loaded weapons, in violation of local ordinance. In another incident, scores of police officers were needed to contain a crowd of about 500 people in the club’s parking lot.
Trustees cited more than 1,000 police calls to the club since 1992, including the arrest of a musician on drug charges and the fatal shooting of Kevin Toma, 15, of Glendale Heights, near the club’s entrance during a teen dance there in 1994, when the club was named Toto’s.
Owen filed suit in Cook County Circuit Court on May 15, alleging police hurt her business by harassing customers and employees in the parking lot, and that the village did not present enough evidence to support its revocation of the club’s license.
Owen got a court order allowing the business to remain open pending a court review of the case. The next court date is Nov. 18, a status hearing, according to Schaumburg Assistant Village Atty. Rita Elsner.
“The manner in which Jackhammer was conducting business was highly detrimental to the community and violates a number of our ordinances, including zoning,” Schaumburg Village Atty. Jack Siegel said. “We were hoping that Downtown could come in and alleviate the situation.”
