NORFOLK, Va. — Wednesday, attorneys representing the Downtown Norfolk nightclub Scotty Quixx sought a preliminary injunction over the city's revocation of their special exception permit.
This comes weeks after the nightclub's ownership formally filed a multi-million dollar lawsuit against the city, claiming damages from lost sales, reputation and inventory.
For the first time in a formal court setting, Scotty Quixx's legal representation pushed back on the allegations and information that led City Council to revoke their permitting earlier this year.
On September 27, Norfolk's City Council revoked the nightclub's permitting citing an inconsistency of meal tax reporting to both the city and the Virginia Alcoholic Beverage Control.
Attorneys argued these made up "speculative violations."
The lawsuit alleges the Virginia ABC has not charged or found Scotty Quixx with any violation. In addition, if the reporting inconsistencies had been proven true, attorneys argue it should have led city council to placing Scotty Quixx on an "Audit List" and not revoking their special exception permit altogether.
"Single out and treated differently" is the phrase echoed by representing attorneys, as they argued the city failed to follow its own ordinance, thus prompting the motion for preliminary injunctive relief.
At the Mighty Dream Forum this fall, Pharrell Williams told reporters he didn't think the Downtown developments were fair to the business owners.
"If they had really a problem and really cared about helping they’d talk to these people and educate them, and say ‘This isn’t going to fly,'" Williams said.
Attorneys Wednesday also pointed out the city's revocation of Scotty Quixx altered the possible sale price of the building the nightclub is located in, dropped the value from roughly $2.2 million down to $1.5 million.
The parties could not resolve the issue by close of court Wednesday, so it will resume again at 1:30 p.m. Thursday, where a judge will weigh whether to issue the temporary injunctive relief sought by Scotty Quixx.