A restaurant that was the scene of a deadly shooting last week has been evicted.
Chad Walker of Walker Properties, which owns the building at 701 National Ave., announced Tuesday to surrounding neighborhoods that they had taken possession of the Warehouse Block owned by restaurant owner Jesus de la Fuente.
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The eviction comes after police were called to the restaurant shortly after midnight on Friday for six people shot. One person, Antoine Clay, 31, was pronounced dead at 12:59 a.m. at the University of Kentucky Chandler Hospital. The other injuries were described as non-life-threatening, police said.
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Walker said in an interview that, without his knowledge, de la Fuente had been operating the place as a club, not a restaurant, for several weeks.
“It was rented as a restaurant and was supposed to close at 10pm, but at midnight it was still crowded, with people on the sidewalks,” he said. “They were having big parties called ‘Toxic Thursday’ and we didn’t know it was happening. The police confirmed this. … It was very difficult.”
El Cid reopened restaurant on the day of the shooting
The restaurant reopened on Friday after the overnight shooting.
Walker said de la Fuente “reopened the same day. The shooting happened at 12:17 pm and he opened for lunch. He has yet to acknowledge that there was a shooting.
He said the gunman, who got out of the passenger side of a vehicle that stopped in front of the restaurant, fired through the open garage door toward a crowd packed into the bar.
Walker said he was surprised to learn the restaurant accommodated people in that location for lunch that day. “It was so insensitive,” he said.
Planned press conference
Walker plans to hold a news conference at the site on Aug. 15 at noon with community and business leaders. “We will also announce the neighborhood’s adoption of a special day of appreciation for our first responders, whose heroic actions and quick response protected the area immediately following this senseless act,” Walker said.
The landlord was trying to oust El Cid from the prominent place on the corner of National and Walton, near Winchester Road, for months. In May, a Fayette District Court judge granted a warrant for forcible detention; El Cid’s owners, Silvia LLC, appealed, but the appeal was dismissed. Walker gave de la Fuente until Aug. 12 to vacate.
The locks were changed at 9 a.m. Aug. 13, Walker said.
El Cid opened on National under different ownership in 2021; de la Fuente purchased it in 2023.
The corner is home to a popular dining and entertainment district off Winchester Road, which includes Epping is on the east side, Mirror double brewing and Roll Oven Pizzeria, Blue Door Smokehouse, Sav’s Gourmet Ice Cream, Void Sake, Wild Laboratory Bakery, La Petite Delicat Bakery and other businesses.
Walker said several potential tenants called after the eviction to express interest in renting the space.
On Monday, A Lexington director Devine Carama said his organization, which seeks to combat gun violence, has reached out to all victims of the mass shooting.
As of Monday, 40 people have been shot in Lexington this year, according to ONE Lexigton’s biweekly report on gun violence.
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