OAKLAND COUNTY, Mich. – Images inside local massage businesses in Oakland County are exposing an underworld of human trafficking going on in our neighborhoods and strip malls.
Those images were among many other items introduced on Friday at a meeting to stop human trafficking targeting specialty businesses in Oakland County.
The point of the meeting was to set up a system to better shut down illegal massage spas, save the lives of the women who are being trafficked, and clean up our communities.
Police call them IBMs — illicit massage businesses.
They operate under the cover of a legitimate business to provide commercial sex acts to customers.
One Thai massage spa on 10 Mile Road in Novi was recently shut down.
Its location: between a preschool and a family ice cream shop.
Photographs from inside some of the busted businesses show what life is like for the women forced to work and sometimes live there — cramped into small rooms and basements, with their trafficker controlling their every move.
The goal of the meeting on Aug. 14 was to share what the Oakland County Human Trafficking Task Force has accomplished so far.
- 29 suspected illicit massage businesses in Oakland County advertise on a paid sex forum site
- 45 citizen complaints filed
- 16 search warrants executed
- 21 undercover operations conducted
- 74 phones seized
“They’ve been trafficked here. They don’t have transportation. They don’t have a place to live. They live in these small businesses, sometimes in strip malls,” Prosecutor McDonald said. “The important thing here is they’re right in our community.”
McDonald said property owners are part of the solution. “A lot of the people who own these properties might not even be aware that this is going on,” she said. “The start is abatement letters — letting the business owner and the property owner know this is going on, we know what’s going on. And then if they don’t respond or leave or cease, they can use local ordinances to shut them down.”
A similar tactic used in other counties resulted in 55% of illicit businesses shutting down the moment they received abatement letters.
Authorities are also targeting those who pay for the illegal activity. “We are holding accountable the business owners for all sorts of things, because there’s a lot of criminal activity that takes place. And then we’re also holding accountable people who go into these places and pay for that,” McDonald said.
Additional steps include business and licensing reviews, since in many cases the women working in these massage spaces are not licensed.
Sharing information across jurisdictions is also part of the plan.
Auburn Hills and Waterford were specifically mentioned for their aggressive approach to combating this crime in their communities.