Cheaters Providence

gawker
Older than dirt
Does anyone know what happened to cause the closure of Cheaters in Providence? Several reviewers of other clubs in PVD mentioned the closing & the problem there. I've been there(Cheaters) a couple of times and was fullly aware it was a brothel masquerading as a strip club.

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tumblingdice
11 years ago
Mad Dog Romeo gave everyone there a lethal dose.
Tiredtraveler
11 years ago
There is a thread about this around 8/12-13. You can search providence news also. In a nut shell about 8/8 or so Cheaters was caught with a 15 year old dancer working there and was offering a full menu in the back rooms to a cop. She was a runaway from Boston being pimped out by a guy providing fake out of state ID's that did not look real.
Alucard
11 years ago
"and was fully aware it was a brothel masquerading as a strip club"

I believe you have answered your own question.
rickdugan
11 years ago
They found a 15 year old girl dancing there, which also led to a prostitution raid.

No loss really. Cheaters has been a shithole for some years now and comparable services can be found elsewhere with better talent for about the same money.
Alucard
11 years ago
Is a Shithole below a Dive?? LMAO
gawker
11 years ago
Well, I guess that explains it. I first went there to just have a beer and check the place out. It was a filthy dive with mostly unattractive people there. A few weeks later I was on my way to the airport, was early and had an hour to kill so I hoped it would be better in daylight. It was not. On this trip I went into the nude room and was not enticed. It was worse than a dive. It was a shithole.
ThreeJ
11 years ago
"No loss really. Cheaters has been a shithole for some years now and comparable services can be found elsewhere with better talent for about the same money."

Are you sure? I went to the clubs just after the Cheaters closing on August 10 and everything is very tight. This is particularly true at Fantasies were the VIP rooms now have open windows for bouncers to check on you.

I never got to go to Cheaters and from what I hear, it's closing is not a big loss. But there's a ripple effect going through Providence and that's the part that sucks.
Tiredtraveler
11 years ago
The manager had have had a dumbass attack or gotten money from her pimp to hire her because according to the news reports her ID's looked fake. After being busted for a 16yo dancer 5 or so years ago and getting off on a technicality you think they would have been more careful.
jack0505
11 years ago
What actually led to them closing was that after the 15-year-old incident, another dancer there offered a cop sex for $ and then got arrested and the next day the club was closed.
shadowcat
11 years ago
PROVIDENCE — A strip club where a missing Boston 15-year-old girl was found dancing in July is up for sale — along with the adjoining adult bookstore, strip club, gay bathhouse and “personal service club.”

Cheaters Gentlemens Club, at 245 Allens Ave., faces a possible closure by the city license board for hiring an underage girl and for the arrest of a dancer who allegedly solicited an undercover detective.

The big pink strip club is part of the “adult entertainment center” listed on stripclubs4sale.com with an asking price of $8 million. The ad says the business and real estate — strip clubs, bookstore, megaplex club, “personal service club,” and two vacant spaces — are valued at $11.23 million.

“This is an outstanding business opportunity that offers cash flow in excess of $2.5 million!”

The ad doesn’t give the exact location in Providence or reveal the names of the businesses, but the description only fits the Allens Avenue properties owned by H. Charles Tapalian and registered to him and his family: Cheaters, Studio 253, Mega-Plex, Adult Video & News, and The Body Shoppe, all listed at 245, 253, and 257 Allens Ave.

Tapalian refused to speak to a Providence Journal reporter Thursday regarding the sale.

The advertisement went up on July 22, a week before the police found an underage Boston girl dancing at Cheaters. The teen was accompanied by a Massachusetts sex offender, who the police say put her to work in the club and was acting as a pimp for her and another 15-year-old girl.

The Providence police say that the teen solicited an undercover detective — and a week later, on Aug. 8, one of the veteran dancers did the same, saying the fee was payable to her and “the house.”

Tapalain closed Cheaters the next day, and a sign was hung on the door that the club was “closed for renovations.” There are no recent permits for renovations at the property on file at the city Building Department.

The city license board is expected to hold a hearing on Cheaters on Sept. 16. Providence police Capt. Anthony Sauro said the police want the club shut down. He says the club violated state law and city ordinance by hiring an underage girl and violated the city ordinance against chronic nuisance properties.

Cheaters came under investigation in 2009, after a 16-year-old runaway from Boston told Providence police that she’d been working at the strip club. That led to a city ordinance and state law banning anyone under 18 from working in the adult entertainment business. Licensed establishments that violate the ordinance face fines of up to $500 for a first offense and up to $1,000 for subsequent offenses.

City Council President Michael A. Solomon, who sponsored that ordinance, plans to introduce legislation next week to require the sex businesses to get criminal-background checks on prospective employees to verify their ages.
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