RIVER NORTH — Infamous nightclub El Hefe in River North has temporarily closed.
A spokesperson for Riot Hospitality, a Scottsdale-based management company that owns the restaurant, confirmed it has “suspended operations” at its River North location, 15 W. Hubbard St. The Chicago location has also been removed from the company’s website.
“We have suspended operations and are exploring options,” said Lissa Druss, spokesperson for Riot Hospitality Group.
When asked, the company would not say whether it plans to remain in Chicago. The bar has active business licenses, a spokesperson from the city’s business department said.
The bar has had a troubled history.
In November 2019, a woman sued the nightclub, alleging staff and security guards kicked her out into a dark alley and stood nearby while someone sexually assaulted her, the Tribune reported.
The woman, referred to as Jane Doe, was at the bar for only about an hour before she was escorted out the back for being deemed too drunk, the Sun-Times reported.
The woman’s attorney told the Sun-Times she may have been drugged, as she was in “a deteriorated condition with her assailant who they believed had drugged her and was making unwelcome sexual advances,” the lawsuit filed in Cook County Circuit Court alleges.
Security footage shared by an attorney for the woman showed a man escorting a woman out the bar’s back door and to a part of the alley where she was assaulted. Two of the bouncers remained near the back door and did not intervene as the attack happened “less than 100 feet away,” the lawyers told the Sun-Times.
The woman was eventually found unconscious and taken to Northwestern Hospital.
The lawsuit ignited a huge response, with more than 5,500 people signing a petition to suspend El Hefe’s liquor license. Another woman soon came forward, filing a suit in which she alleged similar negligence by the bar led to her being raped in 2014.
In 2019, the bar said in a Facebook post that its employees did not witness the rape of the woman in the alley, claiming staff called 911 after discovering the woman unconscious.
“What we understand this woman has alleged is extremely troubling. Any instances involving crimes of violence, sexual or otherwise, are abhorrent,” the club said in a 2019 statement on Facebook.
El Hefe opened its first location in Scottsdale in 2010 and describes itself as a “super macho taqueria.” The chain operates as a Mexican restaurant during the day and switches over to 21-and-up nightclubs at night.
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