Cops Start Downtown Crackdown By Closing Celebrity Training Bar

Though claims of a crime wave in the West Village seem a little overstated, it is a high-profile neighborhood -- high enough for President Obama to take his wife to dinner there during his weekend visit -- and it has had some nightlife-related assault cases lately that can't be good for tourism or public images. So, the Post reports, the city is sending in horse cops to regulate, along with more patrols, a new mobile command center, and floodlights at Hudson and Christopher Streets and West 4th and Sixth Avenue to discourage criminal activity.

But this is just part of a pincer movement against downtown crime: NYPD also brought its crackdown to the East Village this weekend, busting Pete Wentz's bar Angels & Kings for serving underage patrons. Oh, sure, this offense looks like a victimless crime, but when Wentz' patrons stumble out of his place in their pork-pie hats, ironic footwear, and whatever they wear now instead of Ed Hardy t-shirts, they pose a great Pavlovian temptation to the mooks from Jersey who frequent the district, and are too addled to run for it. Prevention works!

We trust they'll also have undercover cops working this recipe-for-disaster.