It was just three days before New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft supposedly solicited sex at a massage parlor in Jupiter. Police investigating human trafficking had been watching the place for more than two months. Now they wanted to record what was happening inside.
They used a “tactical ruse” to lure two women outside the suspected brothel so they could slip inside and plant secret video equipment, according to court records released Monday.
Once the cameras were up and running, police could watch — in real time — as men paid for sexual favors over the next five days, according to the search warrants.
The videos, authorized by so-called “sneak and peek” warrants, resulted in misdemeanor charges last month against the billionaire Kraft and 24 less-famous suspects, along with the owner and manager of the targeted business, Orchids of Asia Day Spa.
The arrests were part of a wider-ranging investigation that snared dozens of men from Jupiter north to Martin County and west toward Orlando.
In addition, the high-profile sting has resulted in unwelcome publicity for Li “Cindy” Yang, the founder and former owner of Orchids of Asia along with other Asian day spas. Published reports show Yang being photographed with Republican heavyweights including President Donald Trump and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. Yang has said she has nothing to do with Orchids.
Meanwhile, Orchids owner Hua Zhang and manager Lei Wang were charged with felonies, and nine of their Bank of America accounts have been frozen, according to records.
Police sought search warrants for their safety deposit boxes in case illegally obtained money was hidden to pay taxes, according to documents. Authorities have seized $140,000 in cash from Wang’s box alone, according to records and her attorney.
Zhang’s attorney, Tama Kudman, said she anticipates the legality of the warrants would come under attack not only in her client’s case, but by the men who were arrested in the parlor bust.
Zhang, of Winter Garden, according to arrest records, already has pleaded not guilty and waived her arraignment on 29 charges.
Zhang, 58, is on house arrest with a GPS ankle monitor at a family home in Hobe Sound, in Martin County, under the conditions of a $278,000 bond. A legal resident of the United States, she is charged with a third-degree felony, deriving support from prostitution.
Zhang also has been charged with 26 misdemeanors called soliciting another to commit prostitution, one misdemeanor count of renting space to be used for prostitution and one misdemeanor count of maintaining a house for prostitution.
Wang, 39, of Hobe Sound, has pleaded not guilty and remains in custody. Circuit Judge Dina Keever has set a bond of $256,000, and Wang would be required to stay on house arrest during her case. Like Zhang, Wang has been ordered not to work in any day spa or salon or in the massage industry.
Besides Wang’s bank account and safe deposit box, the government placed a lien on her house and seized her Mercedes and Lexus and some jewelry, according to her attorney, Paul Petruzzi.
Wang is jailed “with a bunch of people who don’t speak Chinese, including the guards,” Petruzzi said. “She is not very proficient with English. You can imagine how disorienting that can be.”
Even after Zhang was charged Feb. 19, Jupiter police continued to investigate her finances, the newly released records show. Detectives on Feb. 26 obtained a warrant for one of her bank accounts at Wells Fargo, according to court records. They also searched her 2018 Honda minivan on Feb. 22 but didn’t find anything, records show.
On Feb. 21 and Feb. 26, police obtained warrants to search two Bank of America accounts belonging to Shen Mingbi, 58. She has not been charged in the case, but in Zhang’s arrest records, Mingbi is listed as a spa worker who performed sex acts on several of the parlor’s clients.
Warrants released Monday also show that another woman, Lei Chen, 43, had two bank accounts searched and funds frozen as part of the investigation. Chen has not been charged.
The overall investigation began in October when detectives from the Martin County Sheriff’s Office were investigating prostitution at spas — including the Sequoia Apple Day Spa in Hobe Sound — and told Jupiter police one of the businesses was in their jurisdiction.
In November, Jupiter detectives began their investigation, starting with finding online reviews indicating men could go to Orchids of Asia for sex, and then outside surveillance watching men — including a golf cart party of eight — come and go. The investigation also entailed pulling over for routine traffic violations after they left the spa and having them confess to what went on inside, as well as sorting through the trash for evidence, records allege.
Police called on the state Department of Health to inspect the place, ramping up the sex trafficking investigation at the Jupiter establishment. The inspection Nov. 14 revealed evidence suggesting the Asian women who worked there also were living there, because they had beds, medicine and clothing on the premises.
Defense attorneys have blasted police use of the “delayed notice” warrants, otherwise known as “sneak and peek,” as an unlawful tactic even though prosecutors have said they are investigating the case as possible human trafficking.
The “tactical ruse” used to place the cameras was never defined in court records.
Eric Schwartzreich, a defense attorney representing one of the men arrested in Martin County, said his client did not know about illegal activity that went on inside the spas.
That type of warrant was intended by Congress to combat terrorism, he argues.
“Considering that the masseuses and massage parlor owners and patrons were probably not planning to blow up planes in the sky or launch an attack at a concert, using these types of warrants in this case without even exhausting traditional law enforcement surveillance tactics is dangerous,” Schwartzreich said.