Rita Ora's Reps 'Offered Restaurant £5,000' To Break Lockdown Rules And Host 30th Birthday

Representatives of musician Rita Ora allegedly offered £5,000 to a restaurant in Kensington and Chelsea to break coronavirus restrictions and host her 30^th birthday party.

It is also alleged that Casa Cruz turned off security cameras as the guests arrived at the venue on November 28, during the second England-wide lockdown.

Police have claimed that the CCTV was later reformatted, leaving no available footage from the previous month.

Now, Casa Cruz is the subject of a licence review that will be held at 10am this morning.

The Notting Hill venue's boss Scottie Bhattarai told police that he was contacted by one of Ora's representatives on his personal mobile phone and offered £5,000 to open the venue as somewhere for 'drinks and nibbles' for the star's birthday.

Mr Bhattarai said that with most staff furloughed he agreed to 'facilitate' the event, admitting that he had been 'greedy'.

He explained that the event was only supposed to be for around seven guests, but by 9pm almost 17 guests - including Cara and Poppy Delevingne and TOWIE star Vas Morgan - had showed up.

The police were called to the venue at around midnight, and photographs later emerged showing Rita and some of her friends leaving the restaurant.

The report claims: "Security for the entourage wanted no recordings of attendees - Rita etc, to be made, hence (Bhattarai) decided to turn off CCTV between 18.00 and 18.30.''

It also states: "Police received information that the premises was operating in contravention of a second national COVID pandemic lockdown.

"The complainant stated 'large groups of people arrived at the premises through the back door,"

Mr Bhattarai is reported as having been aware of the restrictions, and 'taking full responsibility for facilitating this event without the knowledge of the licensee.'

After the party, Ora issued a statement on social media apologising for the event and agreeing to pay a £10,000 fine voluntarily.

She wrote: "Hello all, I attended a small gathering with some friends to celebrate my 30th birthday. It was a spur of the moment decision made with the misguided view that we were coming out of lockdown and this would be OK... I'm deeply sorry for breaking the rules and in turn understand that this puts people at risk.

"This was a serious and inexcusable error of judgement. Given the restrictions, I realise how irresponsible these actions were and I take full responsibility .

"I feel particularly embarrassed knowing first-hand how hard people have worked to combat this terrible illness and being fully aware of the sacrifices that people and businesses have made to help keep us all safe .Even though this won't make it right, I want to sincerely apologise."

LADbible has contacted Rita Ora's representatives for comment.