The Associated Press

LOUISVILLE - Massage parlors that are fronts for prostitution are going strong in Louisville, and officials are trying new tactics to attempt to shut them down.

The Courier-Journal published a six-page special section in Sunday's editions called "Massage Parlors: Selling Sex." Police and prosecutors say some businesses take in as much as $100,000 a month, potentially doing business with about 25 customers daily.

The newspaper reported that its analysis of court cases showed 12 of every 13 massage parlor workers charged with prostitution a few years ago saw their cases dismissed or were allowed to plead guilty to amended charges like disorderly conduct.

That trend appears to be changing since the city and county governments merged in 2003. This year, Louisville Metro Police have arrested massage parlor workers at more than twice the rate of past years, the newspaper said. And prosecutors in Jefferson County District Court have obtained convictions in 61 percent of the cases that have been resolved since mid-2002, when they were consolidated under a single prosecutor, Assistant County Attorney Matthew J. Golden.

The newspaper's analysis included 127 prostitution cases at 23 addresses since 1999.

The Kentucky General Assembly has passed a law requiring massage therapists to have a state license, and the first ones are now being issued. The Jefferson County attorney is in the process of drafting an ordinance requiring the businesses themselves to have a license.

"Massage therapy is for health and wellness," said Murray spa owner Marcy Snodgrass. "It doesn't have anything to do with a sensual or sexual massage. That's why we're trying to license. We want to give the profession more credibility."

In Covington, police recorded their encounters with women in massage parlors, which often included the start of a sexual act, and used the evidence to help close down about a dozen massage parlors in 2002. The northern Kentucky city also used nuisance laws and local licensing requirements to shut down the businesses.

Meanwhile, Louisville officials have used a nuisance ordinance that carries a $5,000 fine for the second offense against the landlords of at least a dozen massage parlors. That's prompted at least four this year to end leases or evict tenants.

"This is going to be a tough fight," Jefferson County Attorney Irv Maze said. "We are tackling an industry that is well-financed and has a lot to lose. They're in for a fight too."

While more than 30 prostitution cases are awaiting trial in Jefferson County, an attorney for at least one massage parlor has been able to have a nuisance case dismissed. Jim Conkin said he has 20 cases set for trial and plans to challenge aggressive methods police have used in making the arrests. State laws requires nothing more than a verbal agreement of sex for money to make a prostitution arrest.

Prosecutors acknowledge that they issued a memo forbidding police to have sexual contact with prostitutes following an April 2002 complaint by Angela Morgan, who told police that an undercover officer had sex with her inside a strip club where she performed and then arrested her. That case was settled quietly.

"This practice must cease," Golden wrote to county police in July 2002. It "carries with it a certain amount of danger to the public trust in those instances where officers 'go too far' with the subject under suspicion."

The Courier-Journal found that the practice has not stopped entirely. Fourteen of 24 police reports in cases closed since Golden's memo describe police having sexual contact with a suspected prostitute.

"If sexual contact is going on, I have an issue with that," Louisville Metro Police Chief Robert White said. "And if it is going on, it would have to be some really mitigating circumstances."