Hot Springs massage parlor operator facing human trafficking charges after multi-state investigation

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. – Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin announced the arrest of a man facing charges related to human trafficking through his Hot Springs businesses at a Thursday news conference.

Griffin said Zengguang “Gary” Liu was taken into custody by the U.S. Marshals Service and the Oklahoma City Police Department. While in custody there, Griffin said, multiple Arkansas warrants were served on him.

Griffin said the warrants were related to a July 28 raid on three Hot Springs massage parlors as part of his office’s ongoing Operation Obscure Vision that began in January. Information gathered in the raids determined that Liu owned the three parlors.

Liu is facing felony charges of trafficking of persons and unauthorized use of another person’s property to facilitate certain crimes, the attorney general said.

“In addition to gathering information that led us to the owner of the establishments, we seized about $16,000 in cash, including currency from China and four other foreign countries,” Griffin said. “We also obtained valuable information about how these establishments work and how the victims, who are forced to work as sex slaves, are being lured and transported to the United States.”

Three Chinese nationals were provided services following the raids, Griffin said.

Griffin said one victim explained that a social media video in China promised her work in America. Seeing the video, she spent her life savings to fly to Turkey, where she was given a visa and put on a cruise ship to Mexico.

After arriving in Mexico, the woman continued, she crossed the border on foot and claimed asylum after reaching the United States. Afterward, a friend in California recruited her for illicit massages and she was eventually sent to Hot Springs.

“Another victim gave an almost identical story, and the third said she responded to an ad on a website in China and was sent to Los Angeles, where she also claimed asylum,” Griffin said. “She worked first in Los Angeles and Seattle before being brought to Hot Springs.”

Griffin said two customers of the parlors were questioned and released during the July 28 raid.

Griffin said what was learned through the raids matches intelligence and reports his office has received about Chinese criminals have gained a “firm foothold” in the American illicit massage business.

He is committed to rooting out this crime and holding criminals accountable, the attorney general said. 

In May, the attorney general announced that the state received a $100,000 grant to help address human trafficking.