114 people arrested in crackdown on sex workers in Hong Kong’s Yau Ma Tei
- Suspects include more than 100 women visitors from mainland China, Taiwan and Thailand, police say
Hong Kong authorities have arrested 114 people, including more than 100 women visitors from mainland China, Taiwan and Thailand, in a crackdown on street-level sex workers in Yau Ma Tei.
Chief Inspector Lam Yuen-ling of the Kowloon West crime unit said on Monday 10 of those detained, who were rounded up during the 18-day anti-vice operation, were Hong Kong residents.
Eight Hongkongers allegedly acted as lookouts and intermediaries for a vice syndicate by arranging for sex workers to work in subdivided flats in Yau Ma Tei, she said.
“[The middlepeople] also provided sex workers with condoms, lubricants, mouthwash and disposable towels,” Lam added.
“In return, sex workers had to pay rent as well as service fees to them.”
Police carried out the two-phase operation with officers from the Immigration Department from May 27 to 31 and June 11 to 22 after an investigation.
Officers arrested 110 women and four men during the two phases.
The suspects were detained on suspicion of running a vice establishment, assisting in the operation of a vice venue, living off the earnings of sex workers, soliciting for an immoral purpose or breaching their conditions of stay.
Lam said 90 mainland women, 13 from Thailand and one from Taiwan were among those arrested.
Lam said the operation had smashed a syndicate which had been in operation for about a month.
She also reminded flat owners and tenants that allowing their homes to be used for vice violated the Crimes Ordinance and was punishable by up to seven years in prison.
Lam added police would continue to act to combat the vice trade.
She said the crackdown was part of a continuing operation, code-named Thunderbolt 2024, by police in Hong Kong, Macau and Guangdong.
The annual operation, designed to target triads and organised crime in the three places, is viewed as a “clean-up” campaign in advance of the anniversary of Hong Kong’s return to Chinese rule on July 1 and National Day on October 1.
Police handled 787 reports of triad-related crimes in the first five months of this year, up 6.2 per cent on the 741 cases logged in the same period in 2023.
