YOUNGSTOWN — Magistrate Dennis Sarisky of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court on Friday granted a temporary restraining order that shuts down the Vibes Night Club, 914 E. Midlothian Blvd., where a man was shot to death in the parking lot early March 3.

It orders the South Side business to be padlocked and boarded up until a 9 a.m. March 28 hearing on the merits of the request to order it closed for one year under a permanent injunction.

The nightclub also has seen two other homicides and other shootings since Dec. 12, 2021, prompting Youngstown Law Director Lori Shells Simmons to ask Sarisky for the TRO.

Her filing asked for the magistrate to find that the “felonious conduct at said premises constitutes a nuisance and a continuing hazard to the life and property of the citizens of Youngstown.”

The filing, also written by two deputy law directors, Adam Buente and Jason Small, cites “evidence of chronic criminal activity” and “blatant law violations where individuals inside the bar and in the presence of the operators of the establishment gather in large groups numbering greater than 100 persons.” It notes the three homicides there since 2021.

The filing adds that “fights and incidents of reckless driving on or near the premises involve dozens of persons, each instance of which interferes with public decency, sobriety, peace and good order. The neighborhood has suffered and continues to suffer irreparable harm to the homes, property, peace and repose from hundred-person crowds at the premises,” it states.

After the ruling, Buente said: “We are pleased with the court’s temporary order and will seek all available avenues for permanent closure of this establishment for the benefit of our 7th Ward.”

The filing names as defendants Ellington Enterprises, doing business as Marty’s Patio also known as Vibes Night Club; Marty Ellington, owner of the property; and Brandon Brown, manager of the property.

The city also filed with the court on Monday a verified complaint that asks the court to grant a permanent injunction for maintaining a nuisance on the property under Ohio law. It asks the court to authorize all personal property and contents used in conducting the nuisance to be removed from the property and to sell all such personal property and contents and the property be boarded up and padlocked for one year from the date of a hearing on the matter.

The permanent injunction would bar the defendants from entering or attempting to enter the property “for any purpose whatsoever during the duration of the temporary restraining order or permanent injunction.”

The most recent homicide victim at Vibes was Deandre Stores, 30, who was found when police officers responded there at 2:20 a.m. for a report of a shooting in the parking lot. Officers found hundreds of people in the lot and a nearby area and were directed to the shooting victim, who appeared to have been shot several times, according to a Youngstown Police Department news release. Officers provided life-saving measures until ambulance personnel arrived. “Due to the large, unruly crowd,” officers from Boardman, Campbell and Struthers police were requested for assistance, the release and police report state.

The nightclub, also sometimes spelled Vibez, also was the scene of the shooting death of Marquan White, 25, on July 5, 2022. Three other people — ages 26, 19 and 20 — were wounded in the episode, according to Vindicator files. White was found on the ground, shot multiple times. He was pronounced dead at St. Elizabeth Youngstown Hospital.

And Calvin Moore, 27, was shot to death near the Vibez nightclub about 2 a.m. Dec. 12, 2021. Johnnie McCall, then 31, was later indicted on aggravated murder with a gun specification and other charges in the case. Youngstown police said Moore was found shot in a car in the Vibez parking lot, but there were no “problems in the bar.”

McCall, now 35, pleaded guilty March 4 to involuntary manslaughter and a specification that called McCall a repeat violent offender. McCall also pleaded guilty to a gun specification and being a felon in possession of a firearm and was sentenced to 20 to 25 1/2 years in prison.