Following a month-long investigation, South Portland police have issued summonses to the owner of the Red Stone Spa, an unlicensed massage parlor operating at 585 Broadway.

According to police department spokesman Lt. Frank Clark, the investigation was prompted by complaints of neighbors who suspected the business, in operation since December, was engaging in prostitution. A rotating cadre of female employees worked at the business, with “two or three” on hand at any one time.

“It was always a different group,” said Clark, on Monday.

Although police were never able to prove prostitution, they did discover that the Red Stone Spa was not licensed to operate under the city’s Massage Establishment/Massage Therapist Ordinance. The business also was found to be in violation of South Portland’s adult-use establishment license ordinance, which governs bathing, hot-tub and “pseudo-massage” services. In the case of the Red Stone Spa, Clark said, this included “table showers,” in which customers were bathed by an attendant while paying on a table set up in a large shower stall.

City ordinances bar adult use establishments from setting up within 1,000 feet of a public school or park. The Red Stone Spa could not have offered table showers, even if it had obtained a massage license, Clark said, because the 585 Broadway address is located 321 feet from Mahoney Middle School, 213 feet from Mill Creek Park and 102 feet from the closest point of the Greenbelt Trail walkway, which also is considered a public park.

“These ordinances are there to protect the public and the clients going into these places, to make sure they are being served by a trained massage therapist, licensed to conduct a legitimate business practice, not someone who may masquerade as therapists as a fac?ade for prostitution activities,” said Clark. “But, on top of that, it’s a clear violation of the ordinance to even operate an adult use establishment at that particular location.”

According to Clark, police hand-delivered a letter to the manager of the Red Stone Spa, Lan Song Liu of New York, on Wednesday, Aug. 21, advising him of ordinance violations and asking him to “immediately cease and desist from advertising, offering and providing massages without being properly licensed by the city to do so, and to immediately cease and desist from the operation of an adult-use establishment in that location.” Copies of the letter also were given to the owners of the property owner, H. Rockwell Prout, of Cape Elizabeth. According to a press release issued by South Portland police on Monday, Prout is “separately seeking removal of the business from that location.”

On Friday, Aug. 23, South Portland police issued summonses to Liu’s sister, Lucy Louie, 34, of New York, the registered owner of the Red Stone Spa. She was cited with operating an establishment that advertises, offers and provides massage services without a city license, operating an adult-use establishment that advertises, offers and provides bathing, rub-down or other pseudo-massage services without being licensed, and operating an adult-use establishment within 1,000 feet of a public park or public school.

Louie has an Oct. 16 date to appear in Cumberland County Unified District Court. Fines for the cited violations range from $500 to $2,500, each.

According to Clark, her business was no longer in operation as of Monday, Aug. 26.

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