Club owner: Pacman knows shooterBy Terry McCormick, tmccormick@nashvillecitypaper.com
February 22, 2007
A day after Adam “Pacman” Jones’ attorney said his client had nothing to do with the triple shooting at a Las Vegas strip club, the club owner implicated a member of Jones’ party as the triggerman in the incident.
Robert Susnar, co-owner of the Minxx Gentleman’s Club, said in Wednesday’s edition of the
Las Vegas Review-Journal and later on Nashville radio station WGFX-FM 104.5 that a man seated next to Jones in the club shot three people, including two of his security guards. One of those, Tom Urbanski, is still in a Las Vegas hospital and is reported to be paralyzed from the waist down as a result of the gunshots in the incident that occurred early Monday.
“Tom is the only breadwinner for his family, and one of those shots severed his spinal cord, and he’ll never walk again,” Susnar said in the radio interview. “I don’t know exactly which part of the evening, it’s just hard to stomach this, after you have to sit there and watch his father cry, his wife cry and know that they have no way of supporting themselves, all because some athlete acting like a spoiled child in our club and some wannabe — actually not wannabe gangster, I’m gonna say gangster, so congratulations, he has elevated himself to gangster status.”
According to Susnar, Jones, his girlfriend, his publicist and another man whom Susnar claims is the shooter, entered the club together earlier in the evening and returned together around 4 a.m.
“Pacman Jones, his girlfriend and his publicist all know who this person is,” Susnar said. “They’re acquainted with him. They all know who he is. They came into the club together on two occasions. They sat next to this man. They conversed. The joked around, had drinks, and when we kicked them out, they all left together.”
Susnar, who was not actually at the club at the time of the alleged incident, said he pieced together his account of the story from speaking with employees and eyewitnesses and from surveillance video. All those, he said, produced the exact same version regarding what happened.
Susnar said both in the newspaper and radio accounts of his story that Jones was an instigator of the melee that erupted inside the club. That, he said, was caused by Jones throwing a bagful of one dollar bills onto the stage.
Susnar claims that when one of the dancers reached down to pick up the money, Jones grabbed her by the hair and slammed her head against the stage.
That’s when security guard Aaron Cudworth got involved, restraining Jones. According to the
Review-Journal story, Susnar said that Jones said he was going to kill Cudworth.
Susnar then told the radio station that a female member of Jones’ party hit Cudworth over the head with a bottle of champagne during the ensuing brawl.
Jones’ attorney Warrick Robinson told
The City Paper on Tuesday that Jones did not start the money throwing, instead saying that some celebrities such as Nelly initiated that.
Jones was interviewed late Monday night by Las Vegas police and was allowed to leave for Nashville on Tuesday after answering questions. According to Robinson, Jones is not a suspect in the matter or linked to it. Robinson reiterated that to
The City Paper on Wednesday.
“My comment is that I have explained, I believe, in great detail my understanding of what occurred that morning, and that Pacman Jones is not involved in that in any way,” Robinson said. “I really don’t have anything to except to say that we stand by our account of what happened.”
According to Robinson, after the melee broke out, Jones and his party left out the back door and witnessed the shooting in the parking lot and immediately left the scene.
Susnar’s account says that the person in question went outside and retrieved a gun and began firing shots in the parking lot, hitting three people before leaving.
Las Vegas police spokesman Martin Wright said Wednesday that no new details in the matter have yet been released in the matter since a statement issued Tuesday.
The Review-Journal story, however, quoted an unnamed police department source as saying, “We think the link [to Jones] is strong, but we haven’t been able to verify it.”
Titans officials have declined to comment since the story broke on Monday.
