Gunshots, stabbings, homicides tied to this strip club. Tarrant County leaders want it gone

Early Sunday morning, it happened again.

A fight broke out at Temptations Cabaret. People were asked to leave. And someone pulled out a gun.

Three were shot. A fourth, the gunman, died of his injuries.

Crime stemming from the strip club at 12291 Camp Bowie West just outside the Fort Worth city limits in unincorporated Tarrant County has been well documented over the years.

In 2018, an altercation at Temptations left two shot dead. In 2020, another person died after they were shot at the club. In January 2022, a fight broke outside Temptations and left one dead and another injured in a shooting, and in August 2022, a gunman opened fire and injured four people after another fight spilled into the parking lot just after 4:30 in the morning. In early May, two were stabbed at the strip club.

Temptations Cabaret was temporarily closed after Sunday’s shooting, and as of Tuesday morning its Facebook page had disappeared. The moment had been building over the course of 30 years. Temptations Cabaret operated without a liquor license and few regulations as a result, letting its customers bring their own alcohol.

With a new commissioner in charge of the precinct, could the club see permanent closure?

Thirty-three people submitted public comments to the Tarrant County commissioners ahead of their meeting May 16 asking leaders to close the strip club.

Those who spoke with the Star-Telegram relayed stories of car chases through their neighborhood and people staggering up and down the street.

Tarrant County officials are now having conversations to figure out how to get Temptations Cabaret shut down.

Manny Ramirez, the newly elected Tarrant County commissioner who represents the area, said the Sheriff’s Office received 134 calls for service to Temptations last year.

Lost Creek Estates, an older neighborhood that used to be home to the Lost Creek Golf Club, sits less than a mile away on Camp Bowie West. There’s also neighboring Walsh, whose 7,500 acres will eventually be home to 50,000 residents and usher in even more development.

Ramirez says crime at the strip club is making the community less safe.

“I don’t know why we’ve never taken action before, but we’re going to take action now because we can,” Ramirez said.

Representatives for Temptations Cabaret could not be reached for comment via email or phone.

As he addresses the issue, Ramirez says he isn’t attempting to crusade against strip clubs.

“To me, it’s about the criminal element that’s hovering around that facility,” Ramirez said. “And obviously with years of records, nothing’s being done about it. So in my mind, we have to do everything in our power to shut it down.”

Having the strip club in the area is fine, said Derek Burt, Lost Creek Estates’ HOA president. His issue with the club doesn’t come down to “ethics.”

It’s the crime it brings that poses the true problem.

“When they have a pattern of violence that takes place there, and for whatever reason aren’t able to rectify that then it does become truly a public safety hazard,” Burt said.

Long history

Temptations has been in the area since at least 1988. Its building has stood along the service road since 1980, according to Tarrant Appraisal District records.

Thirty-year Lost Creek Estates resident Thomas Jones says neighbors have been complaining about the club for at least 25 years.

The club has brought problems for around 20 years, says Wes Berkovsky, who has lived in Lost Creek Estates since the late 1980s.

Berkovsky, Burt’s father in law, has seen people staggering up and down the street. He can’t count the number of wrecks he’s seen at the end of the street. And on Saturday morning, he says beer cans and whiskey bottles litter the roadway.

He says he’s figured out how to tell whether the gunshots come from the nearby gun range or Temptations.

Burt didn’t notice the issues about the club until he read about them in the newspaper.

“I just read about it like everybody else, and, you know, thought to myself, well that’s awfully close to home,” Burt said.

Burt has heard concerns about the club from neighbors. Admittedly, he says he doesn’t normally see the crime when it happens with his 10 p.m. bedtime — the club opens at 9 p.m. and stays open until 5 a.m., except for on Mondays when it’s closed.

Every time something happens, though, neighbors are sure to hear about it through the neighborhood social media app Nextdoor. Instances at Temptations pop up on Nextdoor about once a month, Burt says.

Burt says the only power they have is talking to the county commissioners about their concern.

There’s always an “undertow buzz” about what’s going on at Temptations, Jones says. If anything unusual happens, he says it can most likely be traced back to the strip club.

Jones has driven by the club after shootings as police were marking up the parking lot with chalk. He doesn’t like to go near there at night because he feels unsafe.

Many neighbors to the club have concerns about the nearby day care.

Sprouts Academy West is half a mile east from Temptations, and the preschool can see up to 150 kids per day, workers say.

Right as Temptations closes down at 5 a.m., Sprouts opens its doors at 6 a.m. Workers say they tend to avoid the nearby gas station.

Strip club rules

Scroll through Temptations’ Facebook page and you’ll see the club advertises itself as the “hottest BYOB in Fort Worth.”

But what does that mean exactly? Mostly, fewer rules.

Most sexually oriented businesses, like Temptations, choose to operate without a liquor license because having one opens them up to scrutiny, a spokesperson from the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission said.

When businesses have licenses to sell alcohol through the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission, they’re subject to inspection by TABC law enforcement officers at any time. They also have to limit how much alcohol they serve. Strip clubs with liquor licenses also have a limit on what the performers can wear; namely, they can’t perform topless.

There are different restrictions depending on the type of liquor license a business has. Mixed beverage permittees can’t have people bring their own alcohol.

Temptations charges $5 on top of a cover to get in — that’s the sexually oriented business fee.

Even if a business does not have a liquor license, it is still required to take steps to make sure nothing unsafe happens, but that falls under the state’s penal code.

The highest sanction TABC can give is revoking a business’ liquor license. Without that license, it falls on law enforcement to do something about businesses that cause problems.

Closing the club

County officials have discussed the possibility of pulling Temptation’s sexually oriented business permit pulled. It can’t operate without the permit, but only the state has the power to revoke it.

Businesses with sexually oriented business permits report their information directly to the state.

Ramirez is seeking advice from the District Attorney’s office on exploring a public nuisance abatement to get the club shut down immediately.

Such a move could invite a lawsuit.

“At the end of the day, you can’t put a price tag on doing the right thing, and this is doing the right thing for all the citizens,” Ramirez said.

A spokesperson for the District Attorney’s office said the office is aware of issues at the club and that the county was considering “all available options” to protect citizens’ well being and safety.

A representative for County Judge Tim O’Hare’s office did not respond to multiple emails requesting comment.

But after the shooting early Sunday morning, O’Hare responded to a statement Ramirez put out asking for Temptations’ closure.

“I’m in 100% agreement,” he wrote.

What will it take?

The solution for Temptations’ neighbors is simple — shut down the club.

The 33 comments submitted to the commissioners May 16 contained concerns about property values, safety and impacts on the area’s future growth.

“No one wants a home that close to criminal activity,” one person wrote.

“Criminal activity has increased the last couple years and those businesses have no part in our neighborhood,” wrote another.

“I urge you to eliminate this cancer from our neighborhoods by eliminating or terminating their permit to operate,” begged another.

“This establishment breeds crime and filth in the community,” wrote yet another.

Workers at Sprouts preschool say they would celebrate if the club shut down. Neighbors in Lost Creek Estates think a shut down is the best solution too.

In a statement Sunday, Ramirez decried the club yet again.

“How much longer must the residents of Northwest Tarrant County be placed in danger of the crime created by the operation of this establishment?” he wrote in a statement.

And until the club closes, neighbors are left to wonder, too.