On September 18, following a police raid in Lower Burrell and Murrysville, two women were arrested and charged with Promoting Prostitution at two massage parlors. Together with the Westmoreland County District Attorney’s Office, police launched an investigation into “Asian Massage” and “Asian Garden Spa” after receiving complaints and online reviews about commercial sex acts occurring in the businesses.
On separate occasions, undercover police officers paid for massage services at both Asian Massage and Asian Garden Spa as part of the investigation. At both massage parlors, employees offered to perform sex acts upon the undercover officers for an extra cost. The undercover officers refused the services and terminated the massages.
On September 18, officers jointly executed a search warrant upon both businesses. One of the women arrested, Li Cheng, who previously pled guilty in East Lampers for promoting prostitution in 2022, resided within the Lower Burrell business and ran the daily operations. Regarding the other woman, a hearing is scheduled for October 29, and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has placed a detainer on her, due to her immigration status.
The illicit massage industry is one of the largest sex trafficking markets in the United States. There are over 15,000 illicit massage businesses in all 50 states resulting in roughly 124,000 commercial sex transactions nationally everyday. Nationally, there is an estimated 27.6 million victims of human trafficking. Between 2007-2021, the National Human Trafficking Hotline identified 1,897 cases of human trafficking just in Pennsylvania. Within the 1,897 cases, 4,048 victims were identified. Traffickers prey on victims’ vulnerabilities and maintain their control via force, fraud or coercion. Victims often do not feel safe reporting as traffickers will threaten them with arrest and for undocumented victims, deportation.
The CSE Institute supports the Equality Model to combat commercial sexual exploitation. The Equality Model focuses on criminalizing buyers of sex acts while decriminalizing individuals who are bought and sold for sex acts. The Equality Model includes four key tenets: (1) decriminalization of the prostituted person, (2) criminalization of sex buyers and facilitators with a commitment to treating buying sex as a serious crime, (3) a public education campaign about the inherent harms of prostitution, and (4) funded, robust, holistic exit services for victims of commercial sexual exploitation. To combat commercial sexual exploitation, the Equality Model focuses on decriminalizing the prostituted individual and targets the sex buyers. By decriminalizing the prostituted individual, the Equality Model recognizes that prostituted individuals are victims of sexual exploitation and not criminals. By criminalizing the sex buyers, the market for buying sex is significantly reduced, which assists in the overall goal of terminating sexual exploitation.
The CSE Institute commends the Murrysville Police Department, Lower Burrell Police Department, and the Westmoreland County District Attorney’s Office for their investigations into these massage parlors. However, the CSE Institute believes that law enforcement should focus its efforts on arresting and prosecuting the buyers of sex, rather than criminalizing people in prostitution for their own victimization. As the sex trade relies on supply and demand, vulnerable individuals are trafficking into the sex trade to meet the demand for paid sex. Thus, in order to reduce commercial sex exploitation, law enforcement must focus its efforts on arresting the sex buyers and traffickers, rather than the individual being bought and sold for sex.
The CSE Institute will continue to provide updates on this matter.
All views expressed herein are personal to the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Villanova University Charles Widger School of Law or of Villanova University.