![]() ![]() Blakeley bought the Ritz-Carlton in the 1960s and built 60 State Street topped off by the Bay Tower Room a decade later, by which time the couple was at the peak of Boston society, socializing with everyone from Ronald Reagan to Mikhail Gorbachev. Tenley Albright, an Olympic gold medal-winning figure skater and Harvard-educated surgeon. He was a shrewd businessman with a beautiful and impossibly accomplished wife, Dr. Its owner, real estate developer Gerald Blakeley, had made his fortune building office parks along Route 128 in the '50s and '60s while at the helm of the Brahmin real estate firm Cabot, Cabot & Forbes. This is where they would come, in its heyday 20 years ago, the rich and the wannabes, diners who saved up to make a special trip to the skyline dining room. And it left the chandeliers at one of the city's most storied dining institutions in jeopardy of going dark for good. It's a story that began in the shady underground right beneath the well-heeled shoes of Boston high society. By the time this tale of greed, drugs, embezzlement, and lies was complete, two men had been arrested and a legendary Boston businessman was reeling. This is what attracted a young, unknown chef from Rhode Island to show up one day at the restaurant's door, to push his way in with a little bit of mystery and a lot of charm, and to climb all the way into the general manager's job in a matter of months. It's captivating, especially on a night like tonight. Though it's been a while since the dance floor at the Bay Tower has been crowded, or the wait for tables has been counted in months, there is something that still draws diners here: the view from 33 floors above the heart of the Financial District, the North End, and the harbor. ![]() The orange and gold carpet is rubbed bare from nights of dancing years ago, and most of the waitstaff stands by idly, leaning on the bar near the door to the kitchen. Robinson” slides into the theme from Gone with the Wind) on a grand piano in a corner near the empty dance floor. A musician taps out tired, strangely discordant songs (“Mrs. The men are dressed in Brooks Brothers suits, the women have perfectly coifed conservative bobs, and together they look like they'd be more at home in 1983 than 2003. Five tables are filled, most with graying couples just like this one. “It's our 25th anniversary so we'd like a table near the window if possible.” One step into the embarrassingly large, 33,000-square-foot, two-level restaurant and it's clear that that's not going to be a problem. “We have a reservation,” the man intones through an impossibly locked jaw. The air has that silky, Champagne feeling, full of possibility. Besides, it's a perfect night for a special occasion, a crisp autumn Tuesday with a technicolor sunset filling the clear sky. He then drove his vehicle toward an FBI agent who had to jump out of the way to avoid injury, and rammed a delivery van before speeding away, prosecutors said.The graying couple in matching black suits and expensive shoes who step up to the hostess podium at the Bay Tower restaurant are here to celebrate, and they are not about to wait for a table. Last August, as FBI agents and state police troopers tried to arrest him, Diogenes rammed his car into two FBI vehicles, one with two law enforcement officers inside, prosecutors said. Paul Diogenes, described in court documents as an “unrepentant and compulsive fraudster” with a propensity to engage in violent behavior toward law enforcement, used stolen banking information from several businesses and created a fictitious catering company to purchase lobster, sea bass, shrimp, scallops, ribeye steak, and wild boar, from November 2020 until July 2021, according to federal prosecutors in Rhode Island.ĭiogenes, 50, of Providence, then sold most of the illegally-obtained seafood and meat to area businesses, in some instances to the same businesses whose stolen banking information he used to gain credit from food distributors, prosecutors said. (AP) - A Rhode Island man convicted of cheating food distributors out of more than $800,000 worth of seafood delicacies and prime cuts of meat, and of trying to run over an FBI agent investigating the case, has been sentenced to 10 years in prison. ![]()
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