The drab, faded, red facade of the Mac Can Do bar squats at the intersection of Homewood's Brushton Avenue and Kelly Street, one of the most violent corners in Pittsburgh.

Since the beginning of 2008, three people have been shot and killed there, including one man who was fatally shot inside the bar. The owner, William P. McClelland, last month reached an agreement with the Allegheny County district attorney's office to temporarily close his business, which has been designated a "nuisance" by city police.

The closure has sparked a debate in Homewood about whether an individual bar owner should be held responsible for violence in a neighborhood that has long been a hotbed of crime, from drug dealing to shootings.

Since 2007, at least 36 serious incidents requiring police attention have occurred in the 600 block of Brushton Avenue, including a dozen domestic disputes, four "shot/stab emergencies" and another three gun threats.

Whatever the cause of each incident, officials and some neighbors believe that eliminating the bar, first bought by Mr. McClelland's father 30 years ago, will make the area safer.

"I think it's a nuisance and it should not reopen," county District Attorney Stephen A. Zappala Jr. said last week.

Mr. McClelland, who said he has added security cameras and a buzzer system for the front door in recent years, wants to find a way to keep it open, and he argues that few incidents have occurred inside the bar besides last year's fatal shooting.

"I run that business with an iron fist," he said.

But he faces significant legal problems of his own. Mr. McClelland is accused of failing to disclose his lengthy criminal history on a series of forms filed with the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board over the past five years.

He also acknowledges that he's rarely at the bar in person. He maintains his permanent residence in Mississippi, and he said he travels frequently -- at least two weeks out of each month -- to work as a motivational speaker at Boys & Girls Clubs across the country, leaving Mac Can Do in the hands of staff.

Even if Mr. McClelland manages to keep his liquor license, permanent closure for Mac Can Do is likely.

"It's a good bar. It's just the young people," said Greg Freeman, 49, a longtime patron whose mother lives on nearby Alsace Street. "They start standing out there and then all the shooting starts coming."

Ramona Searles, a customer for two decades, said Mr. McClelland has done his best to maintain order.

"It's not the bar. They're going to hang anyway," she said. "He runs them off the corner and they come right back."

Brother Robert Benson, pastor at Homewood Church of Christ, a block away, said his parishioners are weary of hearing gunfire during their Wednesday night Bible study class. He hopes the bar won't reopen.

"I think it will lift the morality on this side of Brushton Avenue," he said.

No one disputes the terror of recurring gun violence at Brushton and Kelly.

Ms. Searles, 49, was sitting at the bar in the early hours of March 30, 2008, when 22-year-old John Allen tried to enter the front door and encountered an armed security guard, Dane Brooks. According to a criminal complaint, Mr. Brooks told Mr. Allen he wasn't allowed to come inside.

Mr. Allen, visibly drunk, kept pushing Mr. Brooks and shouting that he wanted to see his girlfriend, Ms. Searles said.

"Your girlfriend is not here," Mr. Brooks told him.

Then Ms. Searles heard gunshots. She ran to the back. Police later found Mr. Allen lying in the bar's small foyer, with a gunshot wound to the abdomen. He was pronounced dead an hour later at UPMC Presbyterian.

Mr. McClelland told police he had hired Mr. Brooks to provide security, according to the criminal complaint, and Ms. Searles defended Mr. Brooks' actions: "He was just trying to do his job."

Mr. Brooks, now 41, fled and eventually left Pennsylvania. On Dec. 10, a U.S. Marshals fugitive task force arrested him in Newark, N.J., and he was brought back to Pittsburgh. A trial on charges of homicide and firearms violations is scheduled for March 1.

Both of this year's fatal shootings at Mac Can Do happened outside.

Walter "Little Ron" Boyd, 16, suffered at least four gunshot wounds April 28 while standing near the bar. He ran inside for help and died later at the hospital. According to court testimony at a preliminary hearing, 18-year-old Donald Jones admitted to police that he shot Mr. Boyd.

He said Mr. Boyd had robbed a man named "Ty" of a gun, money and drugs, and he and Ty encountered Mr. Boyd in front of Suga Rayz, a convenience store in the same building as Mac Can Do.

Mr. Boyd is the son of William "Ricky" Boyd, the former leader of an East Hills gang who is serving a sentence of 50 to 100 years at the State Correctional Institution Smithfield in Huntingdon County for an aggravated assault conviction.

On Oct. 15, Stefan Whitfield, 34, was shot as he stood in front of Mac Can Do. A pair of private security guards driving nearby chased after 19-year-old Julian Larkins and found him hiding under a car with a 9 mm pistol, according to a criminal complaint. They held him until police arrived.

Within two weeks of the most recent fatal shooting, Mr. McClelland had agreed to close his bar. Now, he would like to find a way to reopen it or at least sell his liquor license.

"I can't go in my own place of business at all. I think that's very unfair," he said.

But Mr. McClelland's personal legal challenges could derail any chance of reclaiming the business. His father, Charles McClelland, who was a correctional officer at the Allegheny County Jail, acquired the bar in the late 1970s and operated it until his death in 2004.

The following year, the younger Mr. McClelland filed an application with the state liquor control board to obtain control of the bar's license, and he didn't reveal that from 1989 to 1995 he was arrested and convicted of selling cocaine five times in Mississippi, according to court records. He also was convicted of illegal possession of a firearm.

Mr. McClelland is on parole in Mississippi until 2011, and he is prohibited from living or working in Pennsylvania. He owns a residence in Verona, according to Allegheny County's property assessment Web site, but he said his primary home is in Mississippi and he comes north only a few days out of every month.

It isn't illegal for a former felon or someone from out of state to hold a Pennsylvania liquor license, but failure to disclose past convictions could result in new criminal charges, said Officer Bob George, a supervisor in the Pittsburgh office of the state police Bureau of Liquor Control Enforcement.

According to court records, police began a background check on Mr. McClelland last year after receiving a complaint about his past. On Sept. 18, he was charged with five counts of making false statements to authorities. He faces a preliminary hearing Jan. 5.

Mr. McClelland said he didn't disclose his history because he was given bad advice by a lawyer when he filled out the liquor license applications.

If he is convicted of the criminal charges, the liquor control board could consider whether to take away his license. The board's licensing bureau has recommended against renewing the license, said Nicholas Hays, the board spokesman.

In the meantime, the corner of Brushton and Kelly has been relatively quiet.

According to police, Mac Can Do is one of nine designated nuisance bars scattered across the city and one of two in Homewood, along with Denise and Earl's on Frankstown Road.

Rick Swartz, executive director of the Bloomfield Garfield Corp., said the closing of a nuisance bar can lead to swift improvements.

He cites the example of the Horoscope Lounge, a bar at Penn Avenue and Graham Street in Garfield that closed in 2007. Since then, crime on that corner has decreased dramatically and three nearby storefronts have been renovated, Mr. Swartz said.

"You can't blame a bar owner for crime that happens three or four blocks away. But you can blame a bar owner for crime that happens in front of the property," he said. "It creates a very serious perception that the neighborhood is chaotic."

Che Green, 33, a former manager at Mac Can Do, believes that Mr. McClelland's bar is not to blame for the bloodshed.

"It wasn't his problem. It was a community problem," Mr. Green said. "The bar reminded me of 'Cheers.' You couldn't go from one end to the other without stopping and greeting everybody personally."

Still, some Homewood residents don't plan to patronize Mac Can Do if it ever reopens.

"No, no, no!" shouted Edward Bradshaw, Frank Brown and Donald Robinson in unison when asked about the possibility of visiting the bar.

"I would like to live," said Mr. Robinson, 62.

All three men were sipping beers at the Honey Dew, a tavern at Brushton Avenue and Tioga Street that attracts an older crowd. It has been on the city's nuisance bar list in the past, but police removed it from the list after problems subsided.

Mr. Brown, 56, said some of the Mac Can Do crowd tried to come to the Honey Dew, but "that didn't last a minute."

The bar owner, Donnie Horsley, kept them away, he said.

"The young crowd, they're going to try to take over. They like slinging, making the fast money," said Mr. Brown, a former employee of the U.S. Steel Homestead Works.

"Stop it before it begins."

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