Liverpool nightclub owners admit guilt after lift shaft plunge horror

Apr 1 2008 Liverpool Daily Post

THE owners of a Liverpool nightclub where a woman plunged 30ft down a lift shaft have admitted failing to ensure the safety of revellers.

Student Leanna Shearer was leaving the Krazy House rock club in Wood Street when she fell down the shaft.

She suffered fractures to her foot and back and spent a considerable time in hospital, but has since made a good recovery.

In the wake of the accident, the owners of the club Cashnext Ltd denied two heath and safety offences, as well as contravening a prohibition notice banning the use of the goods hoist.

But yesterday, on the day the trial was due to start, they admitted one charge of failing to protect visitors from exposure to health and safety risks.

Judge John Phipps adjourned sentencing until today, but he was told it was simply “pure luck” Ms Shearer had not been killed by the fall.

Nigel Lawrence, prosecuting, told Liverpool Crown Court Ms Shearer had collected her coat and was going to leave the club at 2am on New Year’s Day, 2006, when she opened a door to the lift shaft on the 2nd floor.

The faulty lift was not in place and she plummeted to the concrete cellar floor below.

Mr Lawrence said: “The fact that she was not killed is perhaps a matter of pure luck.”

Despite a prohibition notice being issued by Liverpool City Council in 2003 to the company banning the use of the lift, the court heard it was still being used and earlier that evening staff had used it to stock the club.

No notices warning people not to use the lift were in place and because the door had not been locked Ms Shearer simply fell down the shaft.

He added: “That door should never have been accessible to the public. There was no effective inter-locking device to stop people gaining access to the shaft.”

Mr Lawrence added: “It was foreseeable that someone could have opened the door and fallen down the shaft with the most likely effect being death or serious injury.”

Since Ms Shearer’s fall Mr Lawrence told the court the lift had been fixed, but he added the company had failed to cooperate with the council’s investigation and none of the four directors had agreed to be interviewed.

But Simon Antrobus, defending, told the court Cashnext was a reputable and respected company, which had forged strong links with the police to cut down on drink-fuelled disorder.