Two Chinese immigrants who opened several lucrative businesses in Westchester and beyond have been sentenced to prison for a year and a day.
U.S. District Court Judge Kenneth M. Karas also ordered Hong Ru “Bruce” Lin and Kena “Angela” Zhao to forfeit $1.3 million, at sentencing hearings on Jan. 10 and Jan. 17, for operating a prostitution business in violation of the federal Travel Act.
“Simply put,” prosecutors argued in a sentencing letter, “Lin and Zhao got rich from the illicit sex work of, principally, vulnerable immigrants.”
Lin, 51, and Zhao, 46, had worked in restaurants, the hospitality industry and real estate. They were married in 2018, after they immigrated to the United States, and settled in Putnam County.
Attorney Robert M. Schechter described Lin in a sentencing letter as a man who would “sacrifice it all for his family. His mistake was looking for easy money.”
Lin specialized in leasing warehouses and retail spaces, and when the Covid-19 pandemic jolted the real estate industry, he knew that people who operated massage parlors were making quick money.
From September 2020 to September 2023, Lin and Zhao opened six massage parlors in Mahopac, Yonkers, Manhattan, Queens and Long Island. They operated under variations of Emperor Spa, Perfect Spa and Spa Haven. When they were arrested in 2023, they were preparing to open a third massage parlor in Yonkers.
The Putnam sheriff’s office, Carmel police, Yonkers police, Westchester County police and the FBI investigated.
The couple coordinated the businesses, according to the prosecutors’ sentencing letter, using a website to recruit workers, advertise, and schedule customers.
Undercover investigators recorded conversations in which massage parlor employees offered sex for money.
Lin and Zhao pleaded guilty to violating the Travel Act, a law that prohibits the use of interstate or foreign commerce to further unlawful activities. Their attorneys recommended sentences of probation and  home confinement, so that their clients could raise their two daughters and work to pay off the forfeiture.
“This is not a bad man,” Schechter said of Lin. “This is not a dangerous man. This is a man that should not be sentenced to prison.”
“There are no identifiable victims and the employees at the massage parlors worked there voluntarily,” Zhao’s attorney, James Costo, said in a sentencing letter. “Ms. Zhao never threatened anyone with violence, nor was any individual ever harmed.”
Assistant prosecutors Ryan W. Allison, Jamie Bagliebter and Margaret N. Vasu recommended two years in prison.
The prostitution industry is inherently coercive, they said, “even if Lin and Zhao themselves did not use fraud, force, or coercion to compel their employees to offer sex work.”
Many of the employees spoke no English, appeared to be recent immigrants, and lived in spare rooms at the parlors. Lin and Zhao capitalized on their employees’ desperation, exposing them to risky situations, criminal records, and deportation.
The employees, the prosecutors argued, were the victims.
