ORANGE PARK, FL. Back in February 2026, state inspectors ordered Randevou Caribbean Bar and Grill II on Blanding Boulevard closed to the public after finding evidence of rodent activity inside the Clay County restaurant. It was not the first time.
The closure, issued February 17, marked the fourth emergency shutdown at the Blanding Boulevard location since 2020. Inspectors documented 11 high-severity violations and 3 intermediate violations during the February 17 inspection. The restaurant was ordered vacated by February 18 and reopened later that same day after a follow-up inspection found zero high-severity and zero intermediate violations remaining.
What Inspectors Found
Randevou Caribbean Bar and Grill II: Emergency Closure History
The February closure was triggered specifically by rodent activity, the same category of pest finding that would shut the restaurant down again just two months later, in April 2026. Rodent activity is among the most serious violations state inspectors can document in a food service facility.
Eleven high-severity violations in a single inspection is a significant total. High-severity violations are the category most directly linked to conditions that can cause foodborne illness in customers.
What This Means
Rodent activity inside a restaurant is not a paperwork violation. Rats and mice move through kitchens at night, contaminating food surfaces, food storage containers, and food itself with urine, droppings, and fur. That contamination is invisible to customers and to kitchen staff who arrive the next morning.
Rodents carry Salmonella, E. coli, and Leptospira, among other pathogens. A customer eating food prepared on a surface that rodents traveled across overnight has no way of knowing it. That is precisely why state law treats documented rodent activity as grounds for immediate closure rather than a warning.
The February inspection documented 11 high-severity violations alongside the rodent finding. High-severity violations are those the state considers most likely to contribute directly to a foodborne illness event. When inspectors find that many in a single visit, it reflects conditions across multiple areas of the kitchen, not an isolated lapse.
Florida's emergency closure authority exists specifically for situations where inspectors judge that allowing a facility to continue serving customers poses an imminent public health risk. The state used that authority at this address four times in six years.
The Pattern Before February
The February 2026 closure did not arrive without warning in the inspection record. In September 2025, inspectors visited the restaurant and documented 10 high-severity violations and 1 intermediate violation. That inspection did not result in a closure.
In April 2025, inspectors found 9 high-severity violations and 2 intermediate violations. That visit also did not result in a closure. The February 2025 emergency shutdown, ordered for fly activity, had been preceded by a clean inspection on February 12, 2025, the day the restaurant was allowed to reopen.
The sequence is consistent across multiple years: a closure, a clean reopening inspection, then high-severity violations accumulating again in subsequent visits, then another closure.
The Longer Record
Across 31 inspections on record, Randevou Caribbean Bar and Grill II has accumulated 250 total violations. That average works out to more than 8 violations per inspection across its documented history.
The four emergency closures span two distinct pest categories: roaches in 2020, flies in February 2025, and rodents in both February and April 2026. That range indicates pest pressure has not been a single incident but a recurring condition at the location.
The two months between the February 2026 rodent closure and the April 2026 rodent closure is the detail that stands out most in the record. The restaurant passed its February 18 reopening inspection with no violations. By April 20, inspectors were back with another emergency order, again for rodent activity, and again documented 6 high-severity violations.
A facility with 31 inspections on record and 4 emergency closures has had repeated direct contact with state enforcement. The February 2026 closure was not a facility encountering serious scrutiny for the first time. It was the third emergency shutdown at that address in six years, and it would be followed by a fourth before spring was over.
The April 2026 reopening inspection, conducted April 21, found zero high-severity and zero intermediate violations. Whether conditions at the restaurant have held since that inspection is not reflected in the available data.