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“Sexual noises” pouring out of a San Diego massage parlor that disturbed nearby church services helped launch a police sting operation that uncovered a sex-for-pay operation in the SoCal city, police revealed last week.
“The San Diego Police Department takes neighborhood complaints of this nature very seriously,” Police Chief Nisleit said in a press release last week. “Our Vice Unit’s thorough investigation into the operation at businesses just like Ocean Spa bring peace and civility back to San Diego neighborhoods. We are grateful for the collaboration with the City Attorney to eliminate this type of criminal conduct in our communities.”
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Police said they fielded numerous complaints from neighboring business owners and residents of the Ocean Spa Massage Parlor, and soon launched an operation at the location. Complaints ranged from “sexual noises” disturbing a church service to locals spotting people having sex in cars, according to police. A youth Bible study group was previously located next to the parlor, according to CBS8.
“Neighboring businesses complained the site was the source of foot traffic at odd hours, people having intercourse in parked cars and sexual noises loud enough to disrupt a nearby church service. After receiving numerous community complaints regarding illicit sexual activities at Ocean Spa, including criminal, nuisance and lewd activities, SDPD’s Vice Unit began an extensive and thorough investigation into these complaints,” San Diego police reported.
G-STRING-CLAD PROSTITUTES PROWL SAN DIEGO STREETS; FAMILIES, BUSINESSES FORCED TO SCRAMBLE
Outside the Ocean Spa Massage Parlor, which operated out of a business complex in San Diego.(Google Maps )
Police devoted more than 125 hours last year investigating the massage parlor, which ultimately led to at least four instances where undercover cops were offered sex by employees. Police additionally uncovered at least 1,270 online ads for sex at the parlor over the last five years.
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Four people were arrested for prostitution, while the city is taking legal action to shut the parlor down, including the City Attorney’s Office seeking more than $100,000 in civil penalties and reimbursement for attorney fees and law enforcement costs.
“The owners of Ocean Spa have been masquerading as a legitimate business for far too long,” City Attorney Mara Elliott said in the press release. “Ocean Spa is a sex shop – not a massage parlor – and it has no place in our community or anywhere else. We look forward to holding these perpetrators accountable and to restoring peace in this complex.”
Prostitution issues in San Diego have increased since California’s controversial S.B. 357 began making headlines, according to a business owner.(Fox News Digital)
San Diego and the surrounding areas have long struggled with prostitution issues, though locals and other Californians argue a relatively new law has exacerbated the problem.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 357 in July 2022, which repealed a previous law that banned loitering with the intent to engage in prostitution. The bill was championed as one that would help protect transgender women from being targeted by police.
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NEARLY NAKED PROSTITUTES PROWL STREETS IN BROAD DAYLIGHT, BUT CALIFORNIA LAW TIES POLICE HANDS: MAYOR
“The author brought forth this legislation because the crime of loitering has disproportionately impacted Black and brown women and members of the LGBTQ community,” the governor said when signing the bill into law.
The reparations package notably does not have a bill proposing cash payments to descendants of African Americans in the state, a notion that even Gov. Gavin Newsom, D-Calif., declined to endorse last year.(California Governor Gavin Newsom YouTube channel)
“To be clear, this bill does not legalize prostitution. It simply revokes provisions of the law that have led to disproportionate harassment of women and transgender adults. While I agree with the author’s intent, and I am signing this legislation, we must be cautious about its implementation. My administration will monitor crime and prosecution trends for any possible unintended consequences and will act to mitigate any such impacts.”
The law took effect in January of last year, which business owners and local leaders have argued emboldened prostitutes and pimps to prowl city streets for johns with few repercussions.
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A local San Diego business owner who spoke to Fox News Digital under the condition of anonymity following the massage parlor bust said though prostitution and massage parlors offering sex has “always been pretty common,” SB 357 emboldened pimps and prostitutes. The business owner is not located directly near the massage parlor, but about 20 minutes away where prostitutes brazenly walk the streets in skimpy outfits looking for johns.
CALIFORNIA PROSTITUTION LAW ALLOWS SEX ABUSE TO ‘RUN RAMPANT’ IN LOS ANGELES STREETS, VICTIM ADVOCATES WARN
A woman standing on the streets in San Diego in high heels and skimpy outfit.(Fox News Digital )
“It’s always been pretty common with massage parlors to offer more than massages,” the business owner said, “but with [SB] 357 the whole industry is emboldened because they know nothing will happen.”
Sex trafficking has also increased due to the law, the business owner argued.
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“Now that we’re starting the second year with SB 357 in place, the prostitution has steadily increased, pimps know they can flood the streets with more girls, and with the busiest boarder crossing here in San Diego, sex trafficking is out of control.”
Prostitution issues in San Diego have increased since California’s controversial S.B. 357 began making headlines.(Fox News Digital )
Meanwhile, prostitutes are becoming more “aggressive,” the business owner said, pointing to how the women will go into businesses and yell at employees.
SUSPECTED PROSTITUTION RING MOVES INTO CA NEIGHBORHOOD OUTSIDE CATHOLIC SCHOOL: ‘PIMP IS BLOCKING MY DRIVEWAY’
“‘I’ll call my pimp and he’ll come take care of this,’” the prostitutes threaten business owners, according to the San Diego proprietor.
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“Residents will try to park in the street parking stall where a prostitute is standing, and she refuses to move and [curses] at the driver,” the business owner continued. “When a john has stopped in the middle of the street to make a deal and backs up traffic, the cars behind will honk their horn so the prostitute will walk over yelling and hit the car or window.”
Other areas of California have also reported repeated instances of prostitutes walking the streets in skimpy outfits in broad daylight, including in Oakland where pimps reportedly stationed prostitutes outside a Catholic grade school last year, while a road in the heart of San Francisco’s Mission District was lined with prostitutes and pimps last winter.
Former Gov. Bill Walker, running to again be Alaska’s top elected official, would like to end the Permanent Fund dividend program with a one-time $10,000 payment to each eligible Alaskan.
“We are in this to solve significant issues,” Walker said in a phone interview Friday. “Business as usual just isn’t going to work.”
Alaska has faced a structural deficit — that is, more expenses than revenue — for years. A sharp decline in oil prices in the mid-2010s, during Walker’s first term in office, led him to take the unprecedented step of vetoing part of the Permanent Fund dividend in 2016. Ever since, lawmakers have spent much of their energy each year wrangling over the amount of the dividend.
Though Gov. Mike Dunleavy proposed a dividend in line with a 1980s statute in each of his annual budget proposals, lawmakers consistently approved far smaller payouts — $1,000 last year, and $1,200 this year — with legislators on both sides of the aisle saying the dividend formula is no longer realistic.
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“The dividend discussion has been the 600-pound gorilla in the room,” said Randy Hoffbeck, Walker’s former revenue commissioner and running mate.
With the existing formula calling for “financially impossible” dividends, there are two choices, Hoffbeck said.
“We can cage the gorilla with a new formula that better reflects our current economic situation and our fiscal situation, or we can actually remove the gorilla from the room,” he said.
Walker envisions asking Alaskans to endorse the idea with a question on the application for the 2027 Permanent Fund dividend, he said.
“If it’s overwhelmingly, ‘Yes, we like it,’ then we would proceed to the Legislature with legislation,” Walker said. “If it’s not, then we will continue with, probably, looking at a formulaic modification in some way that reflects our current fiscal situation.”
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Alaskans would be free to spread the payment over multiple years to avoid a large tax bill, Walker said. And it would be a one-time offer in an effort to avoid people moving to Alaska on a short-term basis to cash in.
“If we paid it out in 2027, people would already have to be here to be eligible,” Hoffbeck said.
Ending the dividend with a one-time $10,000 payment would certainly “stress” the fund, he said. With more than 618,000 applicants for the 2025 dividend, the plan would cost about $6.2 billion.
That’s roughly what would be left in the Permanent Fund’s earnings reserve account, which can be spent with a majority vote of the Legislature and the consent of the governor, after transfers for dividends, government services and inflation-proofing this year and next year, according to figures from the Alaska Permanent Fund Corp., which manages the state’s $89 billion nest egg.
“The $10,000 isn’t a random number,” Hoffbeck said. “It’s a calculated number on what is possible with the current earnings reserve balance.”
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But it would go a long way toward erasing the structural deficit, Hoffbeck said. He estimated that beginning in 2028, ending the deficit would free up about $1 billion in revenue.
“Even though it has a depressing effect on the (annual 5% draw), it’s more than offset from the benefits of not having to pay the dividend,” Hoffbeck said.
Walker’s proposal drew criticism from some of his competitors in the governor’s race. Democrat Tom Begich called the plan “fiscally irresponsible” and “fantastical,” comparing it to Dunleavy’s unfulfilled campaign promise to deliver full dividends. It’s the Legislature, not the governor, that sets the maximum amount of the dividend each year, Begich said.
“We may have underfunded education in this state, but Alaskans aren’t stupid,” Begich said.
Walker and Hoffbeck rejected the criticism, insisting the key difference is that their proposal would provide a one-time payment. They said they’d work with the Legislature to push the proposal through if elected.
Text to Speech audio articles made possible on the CAST11.com podcast network by Fain Signature Group.
The Arizona Department of Transportation has begun work on a paving improvement project along a 10-mile segment of Interstate 17 north of the Sunset Point Rest Area.
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The work to improve the driving surface involves overnight lane closures on I-17 between the Sunset Point Rest Area and State Route 69, which is the turnoff to Prescott. The $10 million project is taking place between mileposts 252-262.
The project is in its first full week and requires narrowing the highway to a single lane in each direction between 8 p.m. and 7 a.m. Sunday evenings through Friday mornings. Lane restrictions will continue through the project’s completion in fall 2026.
The Sunset Point Rest Area ramps and crossroads will be periodically closed during the project. ADOT will notify motorists with electronic message boards when those closures are scheduled.
Drivers should be prepared to slow down and stop when approaching and moving through the work zone.
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For more information, visit the project website at azdot.gov > Northcentral District > I-17 Pavement Rehabilitation: Sunset Point – SR 69.
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SAN MATEO, Calif. (KGO) — Republican gubernatorial candidate Steve Hilton, who is currently leading in the race and is likely to advance to November’s primary, is calling for faster ballot counting as officials continue processing votes.
Hilton appeared in the Bay Area, holding a rally Friday morning outside the San Mateo County Elections Office in San Mateo. There, he criticized the state’s ballot-counting timeline, urging changes to speed up results.
Election officials say the system prioritizes accuracy over speed. California law allows ballots to be counted if they arrive up to a week after Election Day, as long as they are postmarked by then. State officials argue the policy ensures more voters are able to participate, particularly those casting mail-in ballots at the last minute.
Hilton has proposed additional resources to accelerate the counting process, including an “Emergency Election Support Corps” to assist counties.
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Slow CA vote count criticized by Trump, GOP governor hopeful Steve Hilton: ‘Another Democrat fiasco’
“It involves surging workers to these election centers so you don’t just have empty places, nothing happening,” Hilton said. “People working around the clock to make this happen. I’m proposing a regional surge team for every area where the counties don’t have the resources.”
Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office pushed back in a statement, saying, “It’s concerning that a candidate for Governor doesn’t know the Governor has nothing to do with counting ballots.”
Local election officials also disputed Hilton’s characterization of the process. Jim Irizarry, San Mateo County’s assistant chief elections officer, said staffing is already in place and working continuously.
“Well, that’s not correct,” Irizarry said of Hilton’s claim that there are election centers with nothing happening. “Here in San Mateo County, we have two crews working full-time here to actually process all of the ballots that we have. In California, we’re governed under the ‘California Voters Choice Act,’ which provides a 30-day certification process to ensure that every vote that is cast is counted. So it’s very inclusionary. It’s safe and secure, and it takes time.”
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Inside the elections office, ABC7 Eyewitness News saw workers processing ballots, including conducting what officials call a “1% dice roll” to determine which votes will be manually double-checked Monday, a step designed to ensure accuracy in the count. Officials say crews are working overtime, around the clock.
LIVE: See latest election results here
Final results are still days, and possibly weeks, away as ballot processing continues statewide.
County elections officials need to finalize their official results by 30 days after the election. The Secretary of State certifies results 38 days after the election.
Hilton is stopping short of claims by some GOP members that California is rigging votes by taking time to count and certify election results, despite continuing delays in final tallies.
