Illegal massage parlors are a problem across the country. What is Winston-Salem doing about them?

 Winston-Salem city leaders are updating the city’s code to crack down on illicit massage parlors — places that offer sexual services while operating behind a façade, often claiming to be a legitimate business or running the operation out of a home or hotel. 

Meanwhile, many illegal parlors are still up and running in plain sight in the city and beyond. And the industry reaps billions of dollars each year with thousands of these businesses spread across the country.

During the city council’s public safety committee meeting on Oct. 14, Winston-Salem Police Department Detective Susan Warner, who specializes in human trafficking investigations, explained a proposed city law that will require massage businesses to apply for permits, submit to a background checks, provide lists of all employees providing massage, list other massage establishments owned or operated by the applicants and provide descriptions of any other businesses the applicants control that will be operated on the same or adjoining premises. 

Additionally, all massage therapists in NC must be licensed by the North Carolina Board of Massage and Bodywork Therapy to operate legally.

“We would work very closely with the state to make sure that the individuals employed by a massage parlor were actually those folks that had certifications to do that work,” Warner said.

Councilmembers had a number of questions, but South Ward Councilmember John Larson raised a concern over the word “moral” being used in the ordinance’s language, which state’s that the city “recognizes that the improper practice of massage and bodywork therapy is potentially harmful to the public. To protect public health, safety, welfare, and morals, the provisions and regulations of this chapter are ordained for the privilege of carrying on the businesses, trades, or professions wherein massage or other physical manipulation of the human body is carried on or practiced.”

“Are we in the business of dictating morals?” he asked.

After some back and forth, Southeast Ward Councilmember James Taylor, Jr. asked City Attorney Angela Carmon, “How time-sensitive is this matter?”

“We can certainly hold it in committee for another month,” Carmon responded.

Why do these massage parlors exist?

In addition to operating out of strip malls or other business parks, illicit massage parlors are often run out of residential homes and neighborhoods. A quick search on websites that offer sexual services show addresses in Winston-Salem that are associated with single-family homes.

According to research by the Polaris Project, the organization that operates the US National Human Trafficking Hotline, almost all victims of massage-parlor trafficking in the United States recently arrived from China or South Korea, carry debts or are under extreme financial pressure, speak little to no English, have a high school education at maximum and are mothers in their mid thirties to late fifties. Very often, the men who seek these services are not arrested and punished. Rather, the workers are. 

Plus, laws governing business registration are almost “tailor-made for massage parlor traffickers to hide behind,” an article by Polaris stated. Sometimes these massage parlors pose as legitimate businesses, obtaining licenses and registering as LLCs.

“Neither states nor the federal government require people setting up companies to include the name of the actual owner of the business in the registration paperwork. What is actually required depends on the jurisdiction. Sometimes the owner’s name is left blank. Sometimes it is filled in with the name of a registered agent or someone else paid to be the front person or point of contact,” the article noted.

Ben Holder, a former reporter with the Carolina Peacemaker and an activist who has spent decades fighting against illicit massage parlors, talked to TCB for its story about how Greensboro Police Department officers were asking for workers for services and arresting them once they had agreed to or were in the process of performing them.

The problem, Holder argues, other than taking advantage of someone who is likely a victim of sex trafficking, is that GPD would charge the individual worker for a crime rather than holding the person “running” the “business” accountable.

GPD updated their policies for investigating illicit massage parlors shortly after this was discovered. Their directives now state that “no officers conducting undercover operations will intentionally touch the genital area of a suspect, or allow for their genital area to be touched by a suspect.” GPD’s updated directives are linked in full here.

Holder argues that law enforcement should simply go to these businesses and ask for their licenses. If they don’t have them, they could just shut them down that way — instead of asking for the service. That’s what the Wayne County Sheriff’s Office did in Goldsboro in August, charging two people at DT Spa with operating a massage facility without a license.

And while Holder has concerns about the way GPD conducts their investigations, what about WSPD? In September 2023, a WSPD police officer arrested a now 61-year-old massage parlor worker who “unlawfully and willfully did offer sexual act as defined in G.S. 14-27.1 Manual masturbation, vaginal intercourse for the purpose of sexual arousal or gratification and for money,” according to court documents.

TCB reached out to WSPD’s Public Information Officer Annie Sims on whether the department has directives for conducting these types of investigations and what they were, but she responded that she “cannot answer” since it pertains to “specifics regarding tactical/operational policy.” 

What does an illicit massage parlor look like?

Many of the illicit massage parlors attract customers by advertising services online. One of these parlors is called Rose Spa on Reynolda Road, which is listed on FindTheSeven, a website that sports the tagline: “Imagination Run Wild.” Details about Rose Spa state that they take “cash only,” and is located at 5545 Reynolda Road. Their rates are $50 for 30 minutes and $70 for one hour. TCB texted the phone number associated with Rose Spa, and received a reply stating that there were “two new girls” and that they were open from 9 a.m.-11:30 p.m. According to the NC Board of Massage and Bodywork Therapy’s lookup tool, Rose Spa does not have a proper license to operate in the state.

The business is also listed on SkipTheGames, a website that regularly posts ads for parlors with ages, locations and phone numbers. The location at 5545 Reynolda Road notes things like “exotic PLAY” and “sexy 36DD.” 

Dozens of mentions of Rose Spa and other parlors can be found on the online community USASexGuide. A flood of NSFW ads greet visitors, pop-ups plaster the screen when clicking from forum to forum. Site users call themselves “mongers,” giving each other advice on where to find escorts, hookups, illicit massage parlors and more. Mongering is referred to as a “hobby” in threads, which are rife with acronyms for services such as “HJ” and “BBBJ.” 

In Winston-Salem’s forum, you’ll find mongers discussing escorts, massage parlors, “streetwalker[s],” strip clubs and more. There are hundreds of comments in the thread about massage parlors, often referencing “AMPs,” or asian massage parlors. And the services each parlor or individual worker offers — such as “FS,” which stands for “Full Service (complete sex)” according to the site’s forum abbreviations page — is the “menu.”

USASexGuide user “Urinal Cake” wrote a review of Rose Spa on Sept. 16, 2023, giving it the No. 1 spot on a parlor ranking list: “Rose Spa on Reynolda- this place just opened up, only been there once, I’ll just say that You-You gal = yum yum.”

A neighbor who lives nearby told TCB that “only men come in and out of that place.” 

“There is no trash that is generated out of that place that I am aware of,” the neighbor said. “There’s a can, but it never shows up out there. The only thing that goes out to the curb is the recycling bin.” 

The neighbor also said that around 15 cars visit the house most days. But Friday through Sunday, that number hits between 20-25. The men who visit don’t hang around. They “get out of their car and go in the house” and then they “get in their car and they leave,” the resident said.

Several other locations exist in Winston-Salem. Houses at 3005 Burke Mill Rd. and 2522 Weymoth Rd., both near Bethel Independent Methodist Church, also show up on websites.

Another one was called Aero Wellness. According to the NC Secretary of State’s online limited liability company database, it was registered as an LLC on Jan. 25, 2023 at 173 Jonestown Road under Pencheng Xu. It took the No. 3 spot on Urinal Cake’s list. Then, it was registered again as an LLC called “Aero Wellness S” at the same address on July 19, 2023 under Cai Yanqun. 

The annual report status on both LLCs? Delinquent. 

On Dec. 23, 2023, user “Rem1985” posted on USASexGuide: “Aero’s owner was arrested on the 15th for promoting. P2 C has info. Sign on door says closed.” 

Winston-Salem’s police incident event search tool shows an arrest for Cai Yanqun on Dec. 15. Court records state that Cai Yanqun was “charged with promoting prostitution due to keeping a place of prostitution by controlling that place and offering shelter for the practice of prostitution.” Pencheng Xu created a new LLC on Aug. 9; this one is called Inner Peace Spa and is located at 6805 Gray Moss Ct. in Clemmons.

In a thread about recent massage parlor shutdowns, user “EugeneSeeking” complained on Sept. 25, 2023 that law enforcement should “lay off Hard Working women. THE AMPs provide a much needed outlet for men.” As reported in TCB’s piece from January, often the women working in these parlors are coerced or trapped there due to debt or fear of deportation. 

“The people that are doing the work are getting the short end of the stick,” Holder said, adding that the people who are running these businesses are “hidden behind so many layers, they’re never going to get caught.” Women are “completely insignificant to everyone involved.”

The neighbor near Rose Spa added that one time a woman mistook their home for the parlor, knocking on the door and saying she was looking for the “lady on the side” her husband had been seeing. 

They also mentioned another incident. When police units arrived at another neighbor’s house that had been broken into, “all at once, all the cars disappeared, and while the cops were here, not one car showed up.” Once the police left, cars started showing up again 20 minutes later.

“That tells you everything you need to know: Whatever is going on in there is illegal as shit,” the resident said.

They say they haven’t said anything about the house to the police because there isn’t much evidence to confirm their suspicions.

“It just sounds like a paranoid bucket of crap coming out of my mouth,” they told TCB. “The yard gets mowed, the place stays clean, they keep to themselves.”

“I honestly don’t know what to think about it. I don’t like it, but….what are you going to say? How are you going to get rid of it? What do you do?”

But it does weigh on their mind.

“I am horribly aware when my children are out in the yard…. I am cognizantly paying attention to what’s going on,” they said. “I’m not turning my back on what’s going on.”

If you or someone you know is a victim of human trafficking, please reach out to the National Human Trafficking Hotline by calling 1-888-373-7888 or texting 233733. It’s confidential and operates 24/7. Call 911 if you think you are in danger.

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