Love Machine nightclub linked to rape charge
Police have charged a South Yarra man with rape in the latest alleged sex offence linked to Love Machine nightclub.
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Police have charged a South Yarra man with rape in the latest alleged sex offence linked to Love Machine nightclub.
Specialist sex offences investigators last month charged the man over an attack which allegedly happened two years ago.
The Herald Sun has been told the accused man has a working connection with Love Machine.
Victoria Police confirmed a 35-year-old man had been charged with rape.
A statement from the force said the charge related to an incident in Clara St, South Yarra, on January 12 2020.
Court lists indicate the man was charged on summons by an investigator from the Bayside sexual offences and child abuse team.
He will appear in Melbourne Magistrates’ Court on June 17.
It comes as a man was committed to stand trial last month over allegations he raped a young woman in a Love Machine toilet on New Year’s Day 2020.
Brandon Arfaoui, 22, pleaded not guilty to the sexual assault in the venue’s unisex cubicle following a contested committal in May.
During the hearing, it emerged detectives were investigating allegations of a separate sexual assault in the same cubicle in the early hours of January 1, 2020. Police allege the two alleged sexual assaults occurred just ten minutes apart.
Police confirmed Mr Arfaoui was not involved in the second incident and that investigation remains ongoing.
A witness in Mr Arfaoui’s committal hearing slammed the embattled nightclub for putting “profits above protecting women”.
The alleged victim’s friend told the court she was left “disgusted” with how Love Machine organisers and security handled the alleged sexual assault.
“The fact that the organisers didn’t seem to care about the women in their club,” the witness said.
The Herald Sun revealed April police want the troubled nightclub closed after compiling a dossier of violence, sex offences and licensing issues at the Prahran hotspot.
The force has applied to the Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission for the venue’s liquor licence to be reviewed after a litany of issues in recent years.
There have allegedly been hundreds of criminal incidents, emergency call-outs and liquor licence issues at the venue in recent years.
Incidents linked to the club in recent years have included a double-fatal drive-by shooting, a VIP area glassing which sparked suburban gunfire and an alleged rape.
Victoria Police confirmed in April it had lodged an application with the VGCCC over a venue in Malvern Rd, Prahran.
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