What is The Hawk, site of fatal Lawrence bar shooting? What we know
The Lawrence college bar Jayhawk Cafe, also known as The Hawk, turned bloody early Saturday morning when an 18-year-old was fatally shot and a 16-year-old was injured. The establishment, popular with University of Kansas students, has a checkered past of lawsuits.
Aidan Knowles, 18, was killed, and his close friend Brady Clark, 16, was critically injured when they were caught in the shooting early Saturday.
Dai’tron L. Daniels-Strickland and Caiden Clem, both 18, are facing murder charges in relation to the shooting at The Hawk.
A Lawrence institution since 1919, The Hawk has been the subject of a number of lawsuits in the last decade.
In 2024, a young patron, Nicholas Nagel, sued the bar for more than $75,000 in damages. The suit alleged that in 2023, a security guard employed by The Hawk carried Nagel through the front door, threw him on the ground, and “struck him,” breaking his upper arm bone. The suit was dismissed in early 2025.
In 2018 and 2019, the Lawrence Journal-World reported on three similar lawsuits against the bar.
That includes a 2018 suit that The Hawk settled out of court with then-KU student Zachary Webb, who alleged he was hit on the head with a bottle by an employee who was both underage and drinking on the job, according to the Lawrence Journal-World.
Lawrence businessman Jon Davis is listed as the president of Jayhawk Cafe Inc. in the Kansas Secretary of State’s business filings. The corporation was forfeited in July for failure to file on time. The Star called Davis for comment and did not receive a response.
In an email statement, the bar’s management team described the shooting as a “senseless and tragic incident.”
Davis is the registered agent for 17 Lawrence LLCs, including the bakery Cleo and Leo on Elm Street. In November, the Lawrence Journal-World described Davis as a “longtime bar operator,” saying he previously developed Leroy’s on New Hampshire Street and a number of historic buildings in North Lawrence.
The Hawk has current drinking establishment licenses listed in both Lawrence city business records and the Kansas Department of Revenue’s liquor licensee search.
KU students told The Star on Tuesday that the bar is popular with underage partiers.
Laura McCabe, spokesperson for the Lawrence Police Department, said in 2025, they did 14 proactive bar checks at The Hawk, where officers go “looking for minors who are drinking, looking for people who have fake IDs.”
McCabe declined to compare the number of reports of underage drinking at The Hawk to that of other bars.
The Star’s Matthew Kelly contributed to this report.
This story was originally published January 20, 2026 at 5:51 PM.
