PITTSBURGH — From rural areas to busy shopping plazas, illicit massage parlors are operating by the thousands nationwide, and experts say the women involved are often victims of human trafficking.
“It’s a mechanism and a system that’s designed to trap people into that bondage,” said Youngbee Dale, a consultant and advocate.
In an effort to dive deeper into the subject, Channel 11 traveled across state lines to interview Dale, who was born in South Korea and now trains U.S. law enforcement agencies on human trafficking. She’s also served as an expert witness on cases involving illicit massage parlors.
Victims typically originate from South Korea and China, where impoverished women have few resources and options to earn a living, according to Dale. Young women can end up on the streets, abandoned, or as runaways. It’s common for those in poverty to become indebted to a loan shark, and in certain harrowing cases, women can end up being sold to traffickers.
“This person will show up, pick her up, feed her and physically drop her off in some brothel,” Dale said. “But, she doesn’t know it’s a brothel, she doesn’t know what this is.”
From there, women can be coerced into performing sex acts in order to pay a debt, which quickly grows with interest. The victims can then be smuggled into the United States, typically transported from Flushing, New York, to cities all across the nation. They are sometimes moved from parlor to parlor, required to work around the clock.
“For the most part, they don’t know where they are,” said Dale. Victims rarely speak English, and possess few belongings. They lack the independence and resources to seek help. Some live together in crowded apartments while others live within the spas.
In 2019, authorities with the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s Office discovered one trafficked woman living within a closet. Four people were ultimately charged across Westmoreland and Allegheny counties. https://www.wpxi.com/news/top-stories/4-arrested-in-prostitution-human-trafficking-ring-in-allegheny-westmoreland-counties/933137182/
More recently, this year, investigators in Washington County shut down two spas operating in North Strabane. https://www.wpxi.com/news/local/2-north-strabane-township-spas-shut-down-employees-arrested-after-reported-criminal-activity/MZ3CKN42OZDUZH62KYFEXXT4EU/
Washington County District Attorney Jason Walsh spoke with Channel 11 about these investigations in a general sense, and said that authorities aim to charge the operators of the spas, who sometimes happen to be women, as opposed to charging the women who are performing sex acts as trafficked victims.
“They’re always offered support, always,” Walsh said. “Whether they do that or not is up to them. In all honesty, a lot of people do disappear.”
With victims opting to vanish, investigators must rely on surveillance and undercover work to build these criminal cases. It can take a significant amount of time to take down just one single illicit business. Walsh said that the investigations almost always stem from community members’ complaints and tips.
“We want to deter that activity,” he said.
New research estimates that there are more than 9,000 illicit massage businesses operating within every single state, netting a combined $1 billion annually.
“It’s sad to say, but it’s a business organization,” Walsh said. “There are places and ports of entry... people are transported to different locations.”
Local law enforcement agencies frequently work with state and federal agents in order to bring charges.
Channel 11 made numerous attempts to sit down with an FBI expert for this story, but a spokesperson denied our request.
Dale said that she’s worked on cases where the operators of the criminal businesses are also being coerced into their work, answering to a much higher party within the organization.
“We’re not ultimately chasing after the ultimate profiteer, because the ultimate profiteer is not the one running the show,” Dale said.
A study found that oftentimes these businesses are registered under anonymous shell companies, and that money laundering can take place using numerous other non-massage businesses within the network, from nail salons to cleaners to grocery stores. https://polarisproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/How-Corporate-Secrecy-Facilitates-Human-Trafficking-in-Illicit-Massage-Parlors.pdf
Dale wants to see legislators provide improved resources to law enforcement agencies, to ensure that those at the top of these criminal networks can be caught.
She further calls on the foreign governments to offer equal rights to women, ensuring that they have improved opportunities and aren’t otherwise forced into a life of prostitution, debt and bondage.
If you suspect that a massage business may be trafficking women, the Pennsylvania Coalition to Advance Respect (https://pcar.org/ ) provided Channel 11 with this list of signs:
Hours of operation (usually open later in the evening)
Employees living on premises
Back entrances, or more covert entrances to the building that may ‘hide’ clients coming in and out from street view
Average clientele is overwhelmingly male
Covered windows
Cameras and buzzers at the front door or entrance
Business is unadvertised or ‘doesn’t exist’ when searched online
Frequent change in employees, high turnover
Employees unable to understand English
Employees do not leave premises
Business is featured on hobbyist websites
Advertisements mention ‘new masseuses’ and/or advertise appearance/attractiveness of employees
If you are a human trafficking victim or have information about a potential trafficking situation, call the National Human Trafficking Resource Center (NHTRC) at 1-888-373-7888 or text 233733 https://www.fbi.gov/investigate/violent-crime/human-trafficking
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