Restaurant boss held after he brandishes shotgun on King’s Road
THE owner of a ‘wild food’ restaurant has been arrested after he was seen drinking champagne while allegedly pointing a shotgun at passers-by and taxi drivers.
Richard Gladwin, 31, was arrested by armed police after reports of him ‘in a shooting stance pointing the shotgun at a taxi driver’.
A council report said he appeared to be ‘heavily intoxicated’ and was ‘waving the gun around which he kept on display in the restaurant’.
Officers arrived at the Rabbit restaurant on the King’s Road in Chelsea, London, minutes later and arrested three men, including Mr Gladwin, on suspicion of possession of a firearm with intent to cause fear of violence.
A report to Kensington and Chelsea council by director of environmental health Nicholas Austin said ‘another male was invited inside from the street and the group consumed a bottle of champagne’.
The Metropolitan Police has made an urgent request asking the council to review Rabbit’s licence on the grounds that it is associated with ‘serious crime’.
Mr Gladwin and his restaurant manager Fred Samengo-Turner, 27, who was also arrested, have been banned from entering the restaurant before a council licensing hearing next Tuesday. The owner has
‘Begged him to
let go’
also been prohibited from taking part in the day-to-day running of the restaurant, ordering stock, handling money or hiring staff.
Under the conditions, there shall be ‘no replica or decommissioned firearm or similar displayed or kept at the premises’. Rabbit opened last year and is run by Mr Gladwin and his younger brothers Oliver, a chef, and Gregory, who grows produce on the family farm in West Sussex.
Pippa Middleton is said to be a fan of the restaurant, which says ‘sustainable ingredients and wines from the family farm in Sussex are served in a bucolic space’.
The licence of the trio’s other restaurant, The Shed in Notting Hill, is also under review.
A spokesman for Rabbit said: ‘There was an incident at Rabbit in August which is being resolved in the correct manner. Mr Gladwin is fully co-operating with police.’
It came a month after police were called to another incident outside the restaurant. According to the council report, on July 29, a male chef had an altercation with a female manager at the restaurant about her sleeping with one of the owners when she was supposed to be seeing him.
She then called Mr Gladwin, who, the report says, ‘grabbed him by the arm, digging his nails into his skin’. It goes on: ‘The victim held up his hands and begged Mr Gladwin to let go, by which time he was crying.’ The chef, who was fired for being ‘drunk and aggressive’, finally managed to break free and run down the street.
All three have been bailed.