Rohnert Park police conduct prostitution sting at two massage parlors

Rohnert Park police made no arrests during a recent prostitution sting at two massage parlors that city code enforcement officials have since shut down.

Undercover officers sent into the Muse Spa on Maurice Avenue and Rosemary Spa near Snyder Lane and Southwest Boulevard on Thursday were offered and declined sex acts by masseuses, according to the Rohnert Park Department of Public Safety. Though prostitution is illegal, the point of the undercover investigation wasn’t to arrest prostitutes, said Sgt. Nick Labonte.

“We want to make sure that people aren’t being trafficked,” he said.

Both parlors remained open after the sting operation, which lasted from about 1 p.m. to 11 p.m., Labonte said.

Labonte said trafficking-related resources were offered to both of the involved women but authorities could not definitively say whether they were being trafficked, noting that the investigation is ongoing.

Don Schwartz, Rohnert Park’s assistant city manager, said the city would move to red-tag the buildings because people had been living there, “which we don’t allow,” he said.

“It violates numerous city standards,” he said.

Both massage parlors showed signs of a spare room being converted into a living space, as well as unpermitted construction and multiple other code violations unrelated to prostitution, said Jay Bradford, the building official for Rohnert Park.

The city doesn’t allow people to live in a commercial facility because first responders could respond as if no people were there, which could endanger a person’s life, Bradford said.

Anybody wanting to enter one of the buildings, to retrieve personal belonging for example, will need to be accompanied by a city official, he said. The building occupants will have the opportunity to appeal.

You can reach Staff Writer Will Schmitt at 707-521-5207 or will.schmitt@pressdemocrat.com.