After one of the SoFA District’s largest property owners passed away earlier this year, a six-figure legal dispute over unpaid rent ensued. It ended with the closure of San Jose’s latest nightlife fixture.
Santa Clara County Superior Court officials ruled on July 30 in favor of a lawsuit filed by eviction specialists Rothbard Law Group. It accused Pete Be Center’s 58-year-old namesake founder of withholding one year’s rent between May 1, 2025 and April 30, 2026. Including lawyers’ fees and damages, the court ordered him to pay $439,427.20 and to vacate the property by Tuesday, Sept. 8.
Be, however, said he has no intention of paying a single cent unless he’s allowed to keep running his nightclub at 439 First St. And he has taken to social media to publicly air his grievances against his evictors.
There was a legitimate reason behind the lack of rent payments, Be claimed, citing an undocumented agreement with the property owner before his death.
“This is a hostile takeover at the hands of our new landlords, who also own property down the block,” he said. “I feel like this was orchestrated from the very beginning. Leading up to court, I offered to pay it in full, and they rejected it unless the agreement included me leaving.”
Vacant since the Uproar Brewing Company closed six years ago, the venue’s founder launched the Pete Be Center late last year as the SoFA district’s latest live music hub.
While popular acts like Smash Mouth, Bassnectar and DaBaby drew large crowds in recent months, Be said he waited in anticipation for downtown’s largest privately-owned indoor concert venue to generate funds to pay down the debts he had accumulated during his buildout.
Working with social media influencers and amateur models who gave him the following necessary to host community-organized shows drawing consistent crowds—still he waited.
The venue’s road to profitability was at the center of Be’s alleged agreement with the late property owner Richard Berg. Over the past four decades, the former law professor had assembled a real estate portfolio that includes shoulder-to-shoulder buildings occupied by tenants that include The Studio Climbing, The Ritz, The Guildhouse and a Doordash distribution center. Along the way, Berg enabled the conversion of uses such as thrift stores and adult theaters into now-closed destinations such as F/X, The Usual, South First Billiards, Polly Ester’s, Glo, Pete Escovedo’s and Angels, keeping his properties populated by owner-operators, many of them nightclubs.
Berg was active in branding the then-unnamed SoFA district and recruiting key tenants, including the startup weekly Metro, in which he purchased a 1% ownership interest in the mid 1980s.
“The deal that I had with [Richard] that he would abate our rent payments until we opened. Once we opened, the total back payment would be amortized over 12 months, and we would pay back over the course of 12 months,” he said. “But as soon as he passed away, the son served me with papers, no communication or anything.”
Be said he never entered into a formal agreement with Richard Berg because he didn’t want extra paperwork to burden a man he describes as a grandfather figure.
After inheriting control of his father’s real estate portfolio, Adam Berg disputed Be’s version of events and pointed to a 2023 lease agreement spelling out mandatory monthly rent of at least $27,500.
The dispute dragged out in court over the summer when Pete Be Center saw its most successful period of operation—generating viral moments that racked up millions of views on social media. Violent confrontations at the venue, however, drew police attention.
Despite the career pivot to enter San Jose’s growing entertainment sector ahead of the Super Bowl and World Cup, Be has not escaped his history of legal disputes.
He was sentenced to eight months in Santa Clara County jail in 2010 following four felony fraud convictions for misrepresenting himself to 30 homeowners who placed deposits for solar electrical systems that were never installed. A court also ordered him to pay $178,146 in restitution.
Sitting on the stage of his hollowed-out nightclub a day before the eviction, Be said his last goodbyes to the staff who kept the concert venue running. He pulled out anything that wasn’t nailed down and loaded it into a U-Haul sitting outside.
He has no plans, as of yet, for another music venue, as Be said he will focus energy on countersuing the Berg estate for alleged unpaid utilities fees.
“I’m not rushing into another venue anytime soon—the scars and the wounds are too deep and too fresh,” he said. “I do need to take a little time off to find my sanity.”
> Be, however, said he has no intention of paying a single cent
The same way Be had no intention of repaying deposits for solar installs?
[Link deleted]
How any business in California can sell enough goods to afford $27k a month in rent plus all the business expenses is beyond me. Close downtown San Jose, it’s nothing but trouble and druggies waiting to prey on others.
Pete not only didn’t pay his landlord, he refused to pay artists, contractors, technical personnel, lighting, laser, visual, audio suppliers, you name it.
Hosting twerking competitions with barely 18 year old girls while he watched on adds another level of depravity to this thankfully failed venture.
Booking Bassnectar (who had to settle in civil court for sleeping with several under age women) and then further justifying that by saying he was never convicted in criminal court due to lack of evidence is another major indication of moral turpitude.
He recently had his entertainer’s permit revoked by SJPD as well.
Once he had his taste of easy money from hosting these 18+ sexually violent events, he was never going back in my opinion.
Good riddance, don’t give this man a single cent of your money as you won’t ever a return.
Don’t let Pete’s lies fool you. The friendly-guy, Hawaiian-businessman routine is exactly that — a routine. Anyone who has actually dealt with Pete knows the reputation is very different from the image he tries to sell the public.
Pete has built a business model around taking advantage of people. He sees an opportunity, finds whoever he can squeeze, and does whatever he thinks he can get away with to make money. That’s not some misunderstanding or a few bad decisions. That’s the pattern.
And the damage his events caused to the SoFA nightlife scene was not minor.
His shows became synonymous with violence and chaos. There were shootings, stabbings, fights, and constant problems outside the venue. Even his own security operation became part of the problem, with allegations of guards getting physical with customers, dragging people around, and carrying firearms. Every show seemed to end with drunk kids stumbling around outside, fighting, screaming, and creating problems for everyone else trying to operate nearby. There were even rumors of kids being as young as 11.
And before anyone claims this is just gossip, much of the evidence was sitting in plain sight on social media. Videos were being posted publicly. People were seeing it for themselves.
Eventually, the police response became so routine that heavy police presence was showing up around the end of his events. The situation got so bad that his entertainment permit was reportedly revoked right before one of his final shows.
This wasn’t Pete being unfairly targeted. This wasn’t everyone else failing to understand his “vision.” This was the predictable result of repeatedly creating problems in a neighborhood where dozens of other businesses have to live with the consequences.
Ask around downtown. The people who actually work in the nightlife industry know exactly who Pete is.
San Jose’s bars and venues communicate constantly. They share information about problem customers, fake IDs, fights, incidents, and people who cause trouble. When something happens at one establishment, the rest of the industry hears about it quickly. That’s why someone who gets caught with a fake ID at one bar can suddenly find themselves turned away everywhere else.
So when Pete walks around selling this carefully manufactured image of being some beloved Hawaiian hospitality guru, don’t confuse the marketing with reality. The people who have actually dealt with him aren’t buying it.
And now comes the biggest story of all: that Richard Berg was supposedly like a grandfather to Pete.
Really?
Pete wants everyone to believe that he had this deeply personal relationship with a dying man and some sort of unwritten understanding that conveniently cannot be challenged because the other person is no longer alive to tell his side.
But there’s an important part of that story people shouldn’t forget: Richard was seriously ill, heavily medicated, and dying of cancer.
Pete wasn’t dealing with someone who was in a position to simply fight back against every decision or tell his side of the story today. He was dealing with a very sick and vulnerable man.
According to people who were around the situation, Pete took advantage of that vulnerability.
Now Pete gets to tell the public that this man was like a grandfather to him and that they had some special understanding that supposedly explains everything. Conveniently, the person who could contradict that version of events is no longer here.
People should be very skeptical of that story.
The reality remembered by people who were around at the time is very different. Pete did not simply arrive, open his doors, and become the success story he now wants everyone to believe. The opening itself involved other people, promoters, and relationships that helped get him there — including people who, according to their accounts, were subsequently screwed over.
He didn’t create this situation because everyone else was jealous of his success.
He created it himself.
Now he’s trying to rewrite the history and wrap the whole thing in a sympathetic story about loyalty, family, and a man who supposedly meant everything to him.
Don’t fall for it.
A sad story doesn’t erase someone’s history. A Hawaiian shirt doesn’t make someone honorable. And a carefully rehearsed public image doesn’t change how someone treats the people around them when nobody is watching.
Pete wants people to believe he’s the victim of circumstances he had nothing to do with.
He’s not.
He’s living with the consequences of the way he chose to conduct himself.
Seems like in your headline you misspelled “Convicted fraudster occupies downtown building with no intention to pay rent”.