A 47-year-old man has been fined and handed a conditional discharge lasting 12 months after pleading guilty to making fake comments in a bid to force the closure of Heaven Nightclub, a prominent LGBT+ venue in central London.
Aldo d'Aponte, who lives on Craven Street in Westminster, appeared at Westminster Magistrates' Court on April 16, where he admitted knowingly or recklessly making false statements during a licensing review for the club.
According to the Metropolitan Police, Mr d'Aponte submitted emails to Westminster Council using the identities of other individuals without their knowledge.
The court also ordered him to pay £85 towards costs and a £26 victim surcharge.
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Jeremy Joseph, who owns the venue, said: "It is not just about what this person did. It's about the bigger picture of the fact that the integrity of licensing hearings is now at risk."
Heaven, which first welcomed clubbers near Charing Cross in 1979, was forced to shut temporarily in November 2024 after police requested its closure following a rape allegation against a doorman.
The venue resumed operations roughly a month later, having agreed to enhanced security protocols and a prohibition on re-entry after 3am.
The accused bouncer was subsequently acquitted of rape and attempted rape charges.
Heaven was shut for a short period following numerous fake comments affecting the license renewal of the nightclub
|GETTY
During efforts to reopen, Mr Joseph learned the council had received numerous negative representations, news which he said left him feeling "mentally completely destroyed".
The fraudulent submissions came to light when a neighbour noticed that a name attached to one complaint did not correspond with the actual resident at that address.
This discovery prompted Joseph's legal team, led by Philip Kolvin KC, to scrutinise the objections more closely, revealing many contained similar phrasing and appeared to have been generated using artificial intelligence.
The submissions were sent from encrypted email accounts and Mr d'Aponte was charged on November 21, 2025, in connection with two specific emails identified by police investigators.
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Jeremy Joseph, the owner of Heaven, has detailed the emotional toll the incident caused
|Through his lawyer, Mr d'Aponte expressed regret for his inappropriate conduct and made clear he was not seeking to excuse his actions.
However, he stated frustration had built up over prolonged efforts to "secure real action from Heaven's management team".
Police had described the club in 2024 as the "highest crime generator in the borough".
Mr D'Aponte added: "My young family, local residents and club patrons have, week after week, been subjected to an unsafe and often dangerous environment."
He cited multiple documented incidents of mismanagement, including public nuisance issues and violent assaults near the venue's entrance, smoking area and queue.
Mr Joseph pursued the prosecution following the club's reopening to demonstrate that "any objection might not be genuine", expressing concern Westminster and councils nationwide were failing to conduct adequate verification.
Westminster Council responded it examined every submission and would dismiss vexatious representations, noting written evidence carried less weight than in-person testimony.
A spokesman stated: "The committee made clear that it provided no weight to this petition in reaching its conclusions, and therefore these false representations had no adverse impact on the committee's decision."
Mr Joseph countered this outcome only occurred "because we were lucky enough to find out that these were fake".
He proposed councils should implement basic checks such as cross-referencing objectors against electoral rolls, warning fabricated AI-generated complaints could deny struggling venues the licence amendments needed for survival.
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