Go Go suspects seek to dismiss criminal case

Staff report

Youngstown

The defendants in a criminal case against the Go Go Cabaret in Austintown are asking for an evidentiary hearing to dismiss the case on the basis of selective prosecution.

Sebastian Rucci, owner of the Austintown club, filed the motion Friday, saying that the case against him and four co-defendants — Curtis “C.J.” Jones, Derrick L. Dozier, Wayne Penny and Peter E. Sciullo II — has been unfairly prosecuted.

The motion alleges that the Go Go is being prosecuted for what Rucci says is legal lap-dancing. A club across the road is involved in the same type of activity with no police action, he says.

“These are typical lap dances permitted in adult cabarets throughout the country,” the motion said.

Rucci and the other defendants in a multiple-count indictment alleging illicit activities at the Go Go will go on trial in November.

The motion said the club has been targeted through the denial of liquor-license renewals, an unconstitutional padlock closure and a raid that yielded no evidence of drug use.

“The defendants have been singled out for prosecution to prevent the exercise of their First Amendment rights,” he stated.

The club owner was in the hospital recently after he was assaulted Wednesday outside the Thomas D. Lambros Federal Building and U.S. Courthouse on Market Street.

Keith Slade, 27, of East Dewey Avenue, was arraigned Thursday before Judge Robert Douglas of Youngstown Municipal Court on charges of assault and assault of a police officer.

Rucci said he does not believe that Slade intended to rob him. Instead, Rucci claims that someone likely paid Slade to attack him.