Pub owner blames no-smoking law for worker's rape
By Eileen Kelley Special to The Denver Post
PUEBLO - The owner of an Irish pub says the long-standing fight over
smokers' rights has taken a new victim.
Ted Calantino, owner of the Irish Brew Pub and Grille, said an employee
was
raped last month after she walked outside to smoke. Police and city
officials acknowledge the rape but say it is wrong for Calantino to
transform the ordeal into a political brouhaha over smoking.
Pueblo residents last November voted in an ordinance that makes it
unlawful
to smoke inside enclosed public places.
Calantino said that since the ban went into effect last year, there is
always a steady stream of patrons, and at times employees, walking outside
the West Third Street bar for a quick smoke. Now, he said, the ordinance
has
not only had a negative impact on his business - a 15 percent reduction in
bar patrons - but on his employee.
"This ban is supposedly to protect the people who work in bars, which is
stupid, because most people who work in bars smoke," Calantino said.
Police say Alejandro Sanchez-Villanueva followed the woman as she went
outside for a cigarette. Police say they caught Sanchez as he was raping
the
woman, who was able to call 911 on her cellphone during the attack.
The woman was hospitalized for several days; Sanchez is in jail awaiting a
court hearing on rape and kidnapping charges.
Dave Galli, deputy city manager, said what happened was very unfortunate.
But the incident, he said, has nothing to do with a no-smoking ordinance.
"Unfortunately, these kinds of things are going to happen whether she was
walking outside to have a cigarette or walking outside to get something
out
of her car."
