‘Sex sells’ for teen club, promoter says

In line outside, a petite brunet in a black tank top and jeans shimmies into a small white miniskirt and pulls it up, over her jeans. Once it’s on, the teenager giggles, rips her jeans off and tosses them in the bushes.

Toward the back of the line, a group of girls dressed in short shorts and high heels, walks up and joins the pack.

“We look like whores!” one of them exclaims as they greet some friends in line.

It’s 10 p.m. on a Monday night, and the all-ages nightclub OC Platinum in Newport Beach is rocking. In front of the nondescript strip mall entrance there’s a line 50-deep of eager teens dressed in skimpy threads waiting to pay a top-dollar admission fee to get down with their peers. Inside, it’s a hot, sweaty jungle of flailing arms and gyrating bodies. Through the cloud of machine-generated fog, high-schoolers shake their hips like Shakira, twirling around stripper poles atop stages rising up from the crowded floor.

Boys in T-shirts and jeans are glued to teen goddesses, with perfect hair and tanned skin, grinding on each other against every surface — speakers, tables, walls, dark corners.

Amid all of this, photographers and videographers capture it all on film and later post the images to the club’s website, www.ocplatinum.com.

It’s these pictures and videos that Newport Beach Police officers warn parents could pose a safety risk.

“It’s not just your friends that you’re dancing with — it could be other people watching these videos,” said Newport Beach crime prevention specialist Andi Querry.

Kids might not realize that the photos being taken of them are on the Internet for everyone to see, Querry said.

Querry runs several Internet safety classes throughout the year to share information about such websites with parents. Querry has met with PTAs at Newport Beach elementary schools and high schools.

“I tell them this is your homework. You go home and take a look at this,” Querry said.

Promoter Scott Leotti, who’s been running OC Platinum for several years, said the website receives tons of hits. He puts the pictures online because “girls love to look at pictures of themselves” on the Web, he said.

“All the girls love it,” Leotti said.

Leotti is an outside promoter who runs the all-ages club in borrowed space at Hogue Barmichaels, a restaurant at 3950 Campus Drive, near John Wayne Airport. During the summer, OC Platinum runs the club on Mondays and on select nights during the school year.

The club is labeled “all-ages,” but Leotti said they check IDs and don’t let in any men over 21 years old. But age doesn’t matter that much with the girls, Leotti said. The club caters to the “ladies” and they’re more lenient on age restrictions for girls.

As for the minimal clothing, Leotti said club promoters can’t force the girls to dress that way; they do it on their own.

“Sex sells, everyone knows that,” Leotti said.

Every night, club promoters give out between 200 to 300 pairs of “booty shorts” — stretchy underpants with “platinum” written in silver — to female patrons.

The risque clothing and club atmosphere aren’t a secret to the teens’ parents, Leotti said — in fact, they welcome any parents who want to come inside and check it out.

“The parents know. They can see everyone in line,” Leotti said.

If they don’t like what they see, they don’t have to bring their kids here, he said.

A spokesman for the state Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control said Hogue Barmichaels is being investigated for a possible violation of its operation license. Because of high police activity at the address, the restaurant has a restriction on its license that prohibits them from paying an outside promoter, spokesman Everest Robillard said.

The restaurant can use a promoter, but they cannot share any profits — such as admission prices — with the promoter, Robillard said.

“We’re aware of the promoters’ activities, we’ve seen the announcements on the Internet, and we’re taking the appropriate action,” Robillard said. He would not specify what action would be taken.

OC Platinum also operates the Boogie nightclub in Anaheim.

Promoter Leotti said OC Platinum has been a business success since he started; they have about 700 teens on each night.

“It’s been successful; we’ve never had one bad night,” Leotti said.

Nearing the end of the night, a trio of blond teenagers — who look maybe 13 or 14 under the cover of dark eyeliner and lip gloss — wearing lacy bras and underpants, run into the club’s bathroom. In a flash, they’re covering up, quickly pulling on sweatpants, skirts and T-shirts. Once quasi-clothed, they run outside and jump into mom’s SUV.

— Heidi Schultheis

contributed to this article.

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