County of site: St. Clair County
Location of site: Madison St. & IL-3, Brooklyn
Had to remove a photo
Newspaper: Riverfront Times
"Roxy's, a longtime staple of the East Side strip club scene known for its wild "shower shows" and even wilder female employees, has closed.
"The news comes via the club's Facebook page, which shared a post on November 21 announcing that it would be shuttered "until further notice."
'"You can still party with all your favorite Roxy's Foxes at PT's Centreville, Country Rock Cabaret and Diamond Cabaret," the post reads.
"It is unclear why, exactly, the club has closed its doors. When we tried to call its phone number it just rang and rang, and no one from the club immediately responded to an e-mail asking for details.
"Roxy's closed for a week earlier this year after it was the scene of a contamination scare involving the powerful opioid fentanyl in July, resulting in three overdoses. Five people in total who had come in contact with the substance went to the hospital in that incident, including two police officers who responded to the scene. It was a dramatic situation that even necessitated a hazmat team and a quarantine.
"Approximately one week later, Micheal Ocella, the chief operating officer of International Entertainment Consultants, the group that owns Roxy's as well as fellow strip clubs PT's Centreville, Country Rock Cabaret and Diamond Cabaret, told the Belleville News-Democrat that the entire club had been temporarily closed as it was scrubbed and cleared.
'“For the continued safety of our employees and guests, we voluntarily closed our doors and had our building professionally cleaned after the incident last Friday morning,” he said, adding that the East Side Health District had given the club the all-clear.
"Then in October, the Pink Slip, one of Roxy's neighbors and also one of the longest-running strip clubs in the area, shut down for good. As RFT writer Thomas Crone noted in a December 2017 cover story, time has simply taken a toll on the Brooklyn strip club scene:
Brooklyn's scene used to be not only livelier, but also more racially diverse. P.T.'s Brooklyn, also known as P.T.'s Classic, rebranded as Black Magic just one year ago, only to later close its doors. Its primarily white sister club, Roxy's, is still hanging in there, though at reduced hours, with a multi-hued clientele and worker base.
:Meanwhile, the S&L Rub, an erstwhile massage house, is now an empty lot, the same fate that befell Brooklyn Books after a fire. The 'round-the-clock Mustang Sally's, up the road a piece, became a clearance house for, of all things, outdated hotel furniture; it's now empty, the same status as the nearby club last known as C-Ro's. Many a dollar has been made — and lost — along this short, winding, weedy stretch of highway.
"File Roxy's next to all the others, it would seem. Next time you find yourself doing shocking and unspeakable things to yourself or a friend in your shower, spare a thought for the bygone club. It's truly the end of an era." ~ Riverfront Times, By Daniel Hill on Tue, Dec 4, 2018