PawSox and Foxy Lady Strip Club Received Federal Coronavirus Loans

MLB’s Boston Red Sox minor league affiliate and an infamous Providence strip club are among nearly 2,500 Rhode Island companies that have secured emergency loans of over 150,000. $ as part of Congressional $ 2 trillion stimulus package to mitigate the economic impact of the coronavirus pandemic, according to data released Monday by the US Small Business Administration.
The Pawtucket Red Sox received a loan worth $ 900,000 under the federal paycheck protection program that kept about 40 front office employees, the team spokesperson confirmed. , Bill Wanless.
SBA data lists two separate loans to the team, each worth between $ 350,000 and $ 1 million, but Wanless pointed out that this was incorrect.
“We will also look at the matter from our side, but we have certainly only received one loan,” he said. SBA spokespersons did not respond to emails seeking comment.
The team, which is co-owned by former Boston Red Sox general manager Larry Lucchino, heads to Worcester, Mass., Next season after efforts to secure public funding for a new stadium in Rhode Island.
Luccino has been a major donor to the Democratic Party for years, most notably to his former Yale Law School classmate Hillary Clinton during her failed presidential campaign against President Trump in 2016, and by donating to the campaigns of the former President Barack Obama, Senator Elizabeth Warren and Congressman. Joseph P. Kennedy III, among others in recent years.
Meanwhile, Gulliver’s Tavern, Inc., the business name of the Foxy Lady strip club in Providence, received a loan worth between $ 150,000 and $ 350,000 to help preserve more than 150 jobs, according to federal data.
Executives of the Patriarca criminal family, including the acting New England Mafia boss, pleaded guilty to federal racketeering charges in 2012 for extorting the Foxy Lady and other strip clubs in the Rhode Island for protection payments.
Club manager Richard Angell, whose father founded the club decades ago, also argued unmistakably to bookmaking charges in the 1990s and early 2000s, and the strip club was briefly closed in 2018 following a prostitution bite.
The company did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment.
Doctors’ offices with physicians affiliated with Brown University were also eligible for large loans.
Among them was Brown Medicine, a nonprofit medical group that was among a dozen state entities approved for the largest category of loans issued, between $ 5 million and $ 10 million. The loan saved more than 400 jobs, according to the data.
Brian Clark, a spokesperson for the university, pointed out that none of the listed entities, including Brown Neurology, Brown Dermatology, Brown Urology and Brown Emergency Medicine, are operated by the university or its medical school, although some have offices on or near campus.