Greensboro police change massage parlor investigation rules - Greensboro News & Record

[massage]

Connor McNeely

The Greensboro Police Department is changing how it investigates suspected cases of prostitution in massage parlors, according to Greensboro Police Chief John Thompson.


The decision comes after police made a pair of arrests at a massage parlor on Guilford College Road on Sept. 22.


According to an arrest warrant obtained by the News & Record, one of the women, Li Ling Liang, 59, performed a sexual act on an undercover detective: “grabbing Detectives (sic) penis with hand to promote stimulation … rubbing crotch on the back of detectives head for the purpose of sexual arousal for money.”


In the months since, both the police department and the Greensboro city government have faced questions over the ethics of allowing sexual contact between police officers and suspects.


In an interview with the News & Record, Thompson said he has directed the department’s vice and narcotics unit not to allow initiation of any sex acts in future investigations.

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When asked why he made the decision, Thompson said that a valid concern had been brought to the department about police officers potentially victimizing individuals involved in human trafficking.


“We could be potentially adding to the trauma of a person involved in human trafficking,” Thompson said. “If we can’t make it on a solicitation charge, I don’t want it to go any further until we have had discussions about how officers can understand whether or not they are dealing with someone who is being trafficked.”


Thompson added that the department is “looking at codifying” the change in policy, which he said clearly spells out that officers cannot initiate any contact with potential subjects.

Inside the investigations​

Before the change, undercover detectives could, in the course of an investigation, ask for sexual acts from massage workers to get stronger charges, according to Thompson.


If the suspect agreed to the solicitation, the detective would then let the suspect initiate a sex act.


Although North Carolina’s criminal statutes state that the solicitation of a sex act is enough for a charge, Thompson said that conversations with the Guilford County District Attorney’s office led him to believe that it is “extremely challenging” to create cases in which solicitation is the only charge.


Alyse Bertenthal, a professor at Wake Forest University’s School of Law, said that although she agrees with Thompson that the prosecution would likely be easier if you have a “confirmatory act," the ease of prosecution should not be the only consideration in setting the new policy.


“In this case, I think the change in policy is less about what makes for a better case than about what sort of conduct the department is willing to tolerate in the name of making a case,” Bertenthal said.


When explaining the potential weakness of a solicitation charge, Thompson gave the example of a phrase commonly used to solicit a sex act: “Happy Ending.”


The slang phrase is commonly understood as a euphemism for when a massage worker would perform a sex act on the customer until they reach an orgasm.


“Well, that doesn’t hold up in court as a solicitation,” Thompson said. “Like, you can’t say, ‘Yeah, we provide a happy ending.' It could be a massage technique. That’s where initiation made it very clear. There was no doubt in anyone’s mind what [the suspect]’s intent was when they initiated that contact.”


Phil Dixon, an expert on criminal law and procedure at UNC’s School of Government, told the News & Record that a solicitation could also be made non-verbally.


“Proving the completed act may well be easier for the State than proving a non-verbal solicitation, but I think that depends on the facts of the case, the officer’s credibility, and the like,” Dixon said.


Dixon added that he wasn’t sure about Thompson’s claim that offering a “happy ending” wouldn’t be enough to show solicitation.


“But that is arguably more ambiguous than explicitly offering a sexual act,” Dixon said. “I would think the common understanding of the phrase would be enough for most fact-finders to accept it for what it is, a solicitation to perform a sexual act.”


Thompson clarified that the expectation for Greensboro detectives was to immediately disengage from the subject and that the detective had to inform his supervisor that the act had occurred.


“People just automatically assume that the officer walks in, gets naked and knows that there is going to be some sex act that will happen and that it goes through completion,” Thompson said. “That’s not the case. Once they’ve met the threshold for the criminal charge, (detectives) disengage and handle it.”

Greensboro’s problem​

When asked whether the undercover detective in the warrant for the department’s Sept. 22 arrests was naked, Thompson said that he “did not know if he was.”


Instead of being specific about the case, Thompson gave an example of how detectives would typically conduct their investigation.


“An officer goes into a massage parlor, they say, ‘Hey, do you want a massage? Lay down on the table, get naked, and I’m going to give you a massage,’” Thompson said. “We don’t know that they’re going to solicit, we don’t even know if they’re going to go down that road during the course of the massage — and then the conversation: ‘Do you offer more?’”


Thompson added that he was not saying that the example followed the investigation described in the warrant.


It is unknown whether the two defendants arrested in September were being trafficked. When asked, Liang’s attorney, Harold Eustache, declined to comment.


Liang and the other defendant, Quilian Shen, 57, were two of seven arrests made in a multi-agency investigation led by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).


After the arrests were made, the landlord of Amazing Spa's property evicted the business.


Amazing Spa was just one of the eight massage parlors connected to two individuals named Chongmei Wei and Li Huang, according to evidence found by Forsyth County detectives.


Wei and Huang reportedly owned parlors in Winston-Salem, which operated out of residential neighborhoods. When authorities heard complaints about the Winston-Salem parlors, the investigation began.


Huang was arrested in Rock Hill, South Carolina, on Sept. 22, and there is currently an outstanding warrant for arrest on Wei.


When asked whether the investigation was still ongoing, a spokesperson from DHS said that no further information was available.


According to Thompson, Greensboro police would perform inspections of massage businesses once or twice a year before the COVID-19 pandemic.


However, once the pandemic shut down the businesses, the police didn't start the process again until receiving complaints about businesses approximately six to eight months before December 2023, Thompson said.

Inside massage parlors​

Women who are trafficked into massage parlors are usually between 35 and 55 years old and are mostly immigrants from China and South Korea, according to the Polaris Project, a nonprofit non-governmental organization that works to combat North American sex and labor trafficking.


Pam Strickland, whose organization North Carolina Stop Human Trafficking helps survivors, told the News & Record that women employed in massage parlors are often looking for a way to support their families.


“They’re told that they will receive a visa, an education, and a license to be a massage therapist,” Strickland said. “They don’t want to bring dishonor to their family, which is a key reason why they don’t testify. They don’t want their family to know what is happening to them.”


A two-year investigation into a massage parlor, Neon Moon Spa in Durham, resulted in arrests and the closure of the business.


According to court documents, the three women employees of the massage parlor worked 12-hour days and slept on the same beds that customers used during the day.


Strickland said that her organization often encourages law enforcement to “dive deeply” into these kinds of cases because very often the women offering prostitution services are not doing so of their free will.


Thompson said that police can’t make the assumption that all massage parlors involved in sexual activity involve human trafficking, but that a policy change is needed because of the potential trauma for victims.


“For me, we’re just going to have to figure out something different because I go back to what could be a potential victim,” Thompson said. “To me, making the criminal case — as complex as it is — isn’t as important as making sure we’re not going to victimize [someone].”

Another way?​

Documents obtained by the News & Record show that the business at which Liang and Shen worked, Amazing Spa, was itself guilty of violating the law because it did not have a state establishment license, which is required by the North Carolina Board of Massage and Bodywork Therapy, a state licensing board.


Charles Wilkins, general counsel for the board, told the News & Record that the establishment license can help cities and law enforcement close illegal massage parlors.


A business offering massage services is “either licensed by the NCBMBT or it is not and should not be operating," Wilkins wrote in an email.


“The establishment license provides municipalities and law enforcement with a tool to fight illicit massage businesses and human, sex, and labor trafficking,” Wilkins wrote. “Illicit massage businesses seldom, if ever, seek an establishment license since they know they will most likely not qualify.”


According to state law, massage businesses not in possession of a state establishment license would be subject to a criminal misdemeanor charge.


However, Greensboro’s city ordinances only require that the person practicing massage therapy has an individual license from the massage board. The ordinances don’t require the business to have an establishment license.


When asked why the city does not require massage businesses to have an establishment license, the city’s assistant collections manager Dorian Lanier declined to comment.


City attorney Chuck Watts also declined to comment to the News & Record.


In response to the requirements of the NCBMBT, Thompson said the GPD will verify whether or not businesses have a state establishment license in the future.


Thompson also said that the department has drafted a letter that will notify property landlords of illegal activity at locations monitored by police.


"If I had a team I could devote to this I would," Thompson said. "Maybe an absentee landlord will ball up the letter and push it away. But we've seen [success] — and Fayetteville has seen some success. There may be a little more oversight instead of just collecting a rent check."


When asked about the absence of the city's requirement of a business establishment license, Greensboro Mayor Nancy Vaughan told the News & Record that she thought the city’s ordinances were in line with state law and that if they are not, then they “need to be changed.”


The priority should be law enforcement’s investigation of illicit massage businesses because of possible ties to human trafficking, Vaughan said.


“Just closing a business will not solve things,” she said. “Sometimes there’s an investigation going on and that takes precedence. It’s important to keep in mind that if there’s a tie to human trafficking, that we investigate it and remove the people being trafficked.”


connor.mcneely@greensboro.com

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