Bar fracas prompts apology by state lawmaker

Rep. Jim Vincent, R-Soddy Daisy, apologized to House Speaker Jimmy Naifeh for telling a Chattanooga-based Web site that Naifeh was among lawmakers at the Printer’s Alley bar.

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. I never saw you there,” Vincent told Naifeh, D-Covington, in a Tuesday meeting at the speaker’s office. “Several people told me you had been there and left.”

Metro Nashville police records show officers were called to Donnie’s nightclub at 12:26 a.m. Feb. 18 for a reported fight or assault, but when they arrived minutes later the people involved were gone, police spokesman Don Aaron said.

A police report stated that a 65-year-old man was assaulted by another man “for hitting his girlfriend.” The one-sentence report provided no additional details.

Doormen and security guards outside Donnie’s looked through photos in a legislative manual and identified Vincent and Rep. H.E. Bittle, R-Knoxville, as the two injured men who emerged from the bar that night.

Reps. William Baird, R-Jacksboro and David Hawk, R-Greeneville, and a reporter also attended the Tuesday meeting with the speaker.

The four lawmakers all said Naifeh was not present at the bar, although Vincent told him “several people told me that you had been there and left.”

The other three lawmakers said no one told them Naifeh was present.

An article published on the www.chattanoogan.com Web site Tuesday quoted Vincent as saying “a number of legislators,” including Naifeh, were at the bar.

Both Vincent and Bittle said Tuesday they did not fight, although Vincent declined to answer questions about a forehead injury he suffered.

Bittle previously said he was hit from behind as he walked out of a rest room by a man he did not know. He said the blow aggravated an old sinus injury, prompting corrective surgery and causing him to miss about two weeks of legislative sessions.

Vincent earlier told the Chattanooga Times Free Press that he could not recall whether a cut he sustained was caused by an arm or bumped heads.

Vincent, who also was absent from the Legislature for about two weeks, said his brother-in-law was terminally ill and he needed to be with his wife and family.

Vincent said he “may have” initially denied even being at the bar when questioned by a reporter.

“I did nothing wrong down there that night,” Vincent said. “I did not see H.E.’s altercation. I’m embarrassed to be brought into that situation. That’s all I’m going to say. I just wanted this to go away.”

Hawk said he was at the bar briefly and saw Bittle on the floor after being “sucker punched” but otherwise knew nothing.

Vincent said he used Naifeh’s name to give the bar credibility so people would not think “it was some fly-by-night dive.”

Naifeh said he went to the bar on one other occasion, about four years ago, with several other lawmakers. The speaker said he expects his Republican opponent in the November election to use Vincent’s false claim against him.

“You’ll see this in ads against me in my campaign,” the speaker said. “I was not there. I want that to be perfectly clear. I was not there.”