Fabio’s goes dry: Beloved bar won’t serve booze after police sting catches staff serving kids

Fabio’s, the much-loved cocktail bar above Spags, has gone alcohol free.

The bar, which sees the likes of HotBox, The Invitations, and £2.50 cocktails, has failed an underage booze test.

A 16-year-old girl working undercover for the police was twice sold vodka without ID, on 15th March and 5th April.

This led to the police asking the Durham County Council to bring forward opening hours by two hours, until midnight.

Fabio’s back in the day @ HotBox

Though a licensing committee was due to rule on the 9th of September, Fabio Ciampolillo, the owner, has struck a deal with the police agreeing to extra door staff, better staff training, and CCTV cameras and keeping his 2am license.

The license ban is from September 9th- 29th, luckily not affecting Freshers’ Week.

The now Mocktail list

A mediation agreement signed by Matthew Foster, Mr Ciampolillo’s solicitor, and Stephen Mooney, the deputy force solicitor, says: “The parties are satisfied that the mediation reached addresses the seriousness of what has happened, whilst leaving the business viable, more responsible/accountable and with better training and measures in place for addressing underage sales.

“Both parties are satisfied that the robust measures proposed will hopefully prevent similar events reoccurring in the future.”

Mr Ciampolillo exclusively told The Tab that it was “unfortunate that his bar staff weren’t working as well as they should have.”

Fabio hopes closing for refurbishment will allow him to…shake things up a bit

The owner asserted however the ban gives the venue a great opportunity for change.

He said: “We are going to close for two days to go under refurbishment and come back with a new look.”

This seems to be a reccurring problem for Fabio’s as back in October 2012 it failed another”test purchase operation.”

Everyone, however, seems to be rooting for Fabio’s, with neighbours writing to the police, hammering home how seriously Fabio is taking the issue.