VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. (WAVY) — Authorities confirm Homeland Security and Virginia Beach police raided four businesses across the city on Thursday as part of a human trafficking investigation.
Two of the locations were on Princess Anne Blvd, the other two on Independence Blvd. and General Booth.
One of the locations raided on Princess Anne was a massage business in the Kempsville Plaza. 10 On Your Side spoke with a woman who works at a place a few doors down from the massage business. She told us she wasn’t surprised.
“Yeah, well I think most of the business owners had a feeling that something was going on,” said Tiffany. “It was pretty noticeable that there was just gentlemen going in and out. No women of any kind.”
Tiffany says she saw the raid going on when she arrived at work Thursday morning.
“This morning when I first came up once I parked my vehicle, I just saw the police van itself. I saw the task force, everyone had their vests on, they had their masks on, saw the guns and assumed it was, unfortunately, for the massage parlor.”
A number of people we spoke to who work at the plaza say the massage business has been there for at least 7 or 8 years.
Tiffany told us it appeared only women worked there and the clientele appeared to be strictly male.
“I mean it’s very apparent you know the girls will sometimes walk the gentlemen out as they leave the parking lot, you see only gentlemen going in and out. You never see female. I know across, the business across the sidewalk here, one of her girls tried to go get a massage and they turned her down and told her they don’t. You know, ‘we don’t service females.'”