Courtesy photo

W. John Hufker III |

An Aspen nightclub found itself in a stinky situation early Sunday morning.

Dozens of patrons fled Bootsy Bellows after a Halloween party rug-cutter defecated on the dance floor, prompting club owner Andrew Sandler to declare on Facebook: “I have a message for the Phantom Crapper … have you no shame sir/madam?”

Sandler was actually flying over the Pacific Ocean en route to Thailand when he was bombarded with electronic messages giving him the scoop.

“My iPad starts blowing up,” Sandler said Monday. “I’m getting these text messages and one of my gal pals says, ‘Someone s— on the dance floor and everyone fled.’”

Sandler and his associates did not know who the culprit was as of Monday.

Bootsy Bellows employees said approximately 75 patrons were at the club when the bowel movement occurred at approximately 12:45 a.m. They did not contact the Aspen Police Department, and they declined to go into particulars about the incident with The Aspen Times.

Sandler, however, seized the opportunity to share what he knew.

“What can you do?” he said. “That’s why I put up the Facebook post, because I like to poke fun at things.”

The club’s general manager, Andy Pappani, didn’t appear to sense much humor in the episode. Maybe it’s because, according what he said on Sandler’s Facebook thread, “I literally had to pick up a poo with my hands and bleach the s— out of the dance floor.”

Another person who was at Bootsy Bellows commented, “Nothing to tell other then (sic) — everyone on the dance floor was hit with the smell at the same time and started moving to the front and then we turned around to see what was making us gag! Disgusting!”

C.J. Oliver, the city’s environmental health director, said human feces can be a health concern at day care centers, but this was the first he had heard of it at an Aspen nightclub or restaurant.

Cleaning the floor with a disinfecting solution containing water and bleach, like what Pappani used, would do the trick, Oliver said.

While Aspen police weren’t officially notified, they had gotten a whiff of the story over the weekend.

“I’ve heard a few anecdotes about this,” said Assistant Police Chief Bill Linn. “And it sounded pretty nasty.”

If a crime were committed, it could be indecent exposure, he said.

“You just never know,” he said. “Speaking hypothetically, if someone had too much to drink or something, no matter how repulsive it might be, it might not actually be a crime, but just really gross.”

Earlier this summer, Pitkin County sheriff’s deputies faced an excrement-laced situation after pulling over a suspected intoxicated driver on Highway 82 near Truscott, a deputy said. The 68-year-old driver told deputies she needed to use the bathroom and would go behind a nearby rock, Deputy Josh Bennett said.

When told that wasn’t possible, the woman, who was standing by the side of the road with handcuffs in front, pushed her pants down, bent over and went anyway, he said. It was a messy situation, said Bennett, who was training a newly hired deputy at the time.

Meanwhile, Sandler and others theorized that the dance-floor debacle was probably caused by a female wearing a skirt or a dress, because a male would have dropped his pants and there would be witnesses to the transaction. Drug use could have played a factor, as well, Sandler said.

“I thought maybe somebody did too much coke that was cut with Babylax,” he said.

On his Facebook thread about the mystery poop, Sandler invited club-goers to return to Booty Bellows.

“You’re safe now and the turd can’t hurt you anymore,” he said. “This is your safe space, please explore it.”

rcarroll@aspentimes.com