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Police target illegal Flushing bar activity

Police target illegal Flushing bar activity
Photos by Joe Anuta
By Joe Anuta

Flushing police have started their 2012 crackdown on illegal activity in the area’s drinking establishments, arresting a woman on charges of possessing drugs at a downtown bar whose legal address was questioned in an earlier report.

At around 1 a.m. Jan. 7, officers paid a visit to Dreamer Music World Corp., a karaoke bar that lists its address at 133-55 Sanford Ave., but is actually located off Main Street.

Officers arrested Xiu Feng Zhu, 49, of Manhattan, for allegedly possessing Ketamine, according to a police source.

Zhu was charged with possession of a controlled substance, police said.

Ketamine is a tranquilizer and anaesthetic common in veterinary medicine and often used to sedate horses. It is used on smaller mammals and humans in small doses for medicinal purposes, but it also is illegally sold as a hallucinogenic drug.

The bust at Dreamer Music World Corp. came two days after the watering hole was featured in a TimesLedger Newspapers report that pointed out inconsistencies between the bar’s liquor license application and reality.

The bar listed its address as 133-55 Sanford Ave., according to documents from the state Liquor Authority, but the sign for the establishment is around the corner and inside a small shopping center at 41-44 Main St.

A door inside that shopping center reads 133-55 Sanford Ave.

Additionally, the bar did not check a box labeled karaoke bar on the liquor license application, despite clearly advertising itself as such on the signs along Main Street, according to documents from the agency.

Bar owners and a lawyer who represented the bar when applying for the liquor license could not be reached for comment as of press time. A man who answered the number listed on the liquor license said it was the wrong number.

The arrest followed a December pronouncement by Deputy Inspector Brian Maguire, commanding officer of the 109th Precinct.

At a meeting late last month, he told members of the community that the squad would be cracking down on illegal activity in bars in northeast Queens, targeting bar owners who used misleading information on their liquor license applications, served underage patrons or allowed drug use on the premises.

Reach reporter Joe Anuta by e-mail at [email protected] or by phone at 718-260-4566.