Coyote Jack’s property case remains in legal limbo
The case between the owners of the Coyote Jack’s nighclub and the owners of the property where it’s located is dragging on as the parties dispute basic facts.
At a hearing Monday, Chancellor Jeffrey Atherton set an evidentiary hearing for April after representatives of Cow Art LLC, which owns the property, and of Bankable Holdings LLC, which owns the club, failed to agree on who the legal tenant of Coyote Jack’s was when the lease was terminated after the most recent fatal shooting at the property in October 2019.
Cow Art terminated the lease after the city of Chattanooga and the state moved to permanently close the crime-ridden club following the shooting death of 19-year-old Brandon Rogers, the third fatal shooting at or near the club in three years.
William Hannah, an attorney representing Cow Art, argued Monday that the lease in question was signed by Tammy Taylor, not as an individual but as an operative of Bankable Holdings, and was therefore breached when the business’s license was revoked last year.
Ronald Berke, who at some point held part ownership of the club, argued that Taylor herself, not the business, was listed on the lease, so the license was not grounds for terminating the agreement.
Hannah and Berke agreed on very little throughout the hearing as Hannah tried to sway the court to take action toward a summary judgment, while Berke pleaded for the court to give him time for discovery and set a hearing for determining some of the core facts in the case.
A frustrated Atherton decided Berke’s questions of fact were crucial enough to the case that an evidentiary hearing was in order.
“It is as unequivocal of a question of fact concerning entitlement of the property as there could be, is it not?” Atherton asked, referencing an affidavit by Taylor that asserts she was not in default of the lease.
He added that there are “questions of fact, questions of law and perhaps some of both” that prevented him from making a summary judgment before further fact finding.
At Hannah’s request, the court also made the parties agree to a date for Berke to be let on the premises and inventory equipment and other property which he has stake in personally based on his unclear role in the club, so that Cow Art may get permission to modify the property.
The litigation on the lease agreement is only one of many legal battles Coyote Jack’s is facing as the city seeks a nuisance abatement against the club, which is also fighting for its beer and liquor licenses that were revoked by the city and state, respectively.