Jail for brothel ringleaders

7:10am Saturday 17th May 2008

THESE are the faces of the ringleader of a prostitution racket and his accomplice who ran a brothel in the heart of Worcester.

The pair were jailed at Worcester Crown Court yesterday for more than 12 years.

Fei Zhang was sentenced to eight years after being found guilty earlier this week of conspiracy to traffic for the sex trade and also conspiracy to control prostitution.

Su Zhen Xu, the manageress of the chain of brothels, was jailed for four years nine months after admitting the same charges and also money laundering.

Passing sentence Judge Alistair McCreath said: "This case demonstrates real exploitation of women under effective coercion. These women may have volunteered but this was no free life choice that any of them made.

This was no more than an escape from poverty. When they came to this country they were little more than slaves."

The judge also praised the police for their work leading to the prosecutions, saying: "I commend those who have taken an active part."

Zhang, 39, a father-of-three who ran a Chinese takeaway business in Barking, Essex, controlled the operation, said prosecuting barrister Jonathan Gosling.

In a trial lasting two weeks, Zhang, of Cavendish Gardens, Barking, Essex, said he had never been to Worcester or had anything to do with the operation but mobile phone, CCTV foot-age and witnesses proved otherwise.

A brothel in Broad Street, Worcester, was raided as part of co-ordinated raids in March last year on premises across the West Midlands, in Wolverhampton, Wal-sall, and Dudley.

The prosecution said Zhang had been having an affair with Su Zhen Xu, aged 29, of Hewitts Quay, Barking.

They began to become aware of his part in the operation only when Xu made numerous calls to him while on remand following her arrest at the brothel in Walsall.

The brothels were thinly disguised as massage parlours and escort agencies, being advertised in local newspapers.

Prosecution barrister Jonathan Gosling said the operation was highly soph-isticated and included at least 20 prostitutes, with total estimated earnings of more than £400,000 a year.

He said that the women were from poor backgrounds in the Far East and had paid a bond, sometimes as much as £25,000, to people traffickers. They got them into the country then made them pay off their debts by prostitution.

They were then released and came into contact with Zhang and Zu's operation where they were trapped and disorientated as they were moved from brothel to brothel in order to provide customers with new girls.

Thomas McKinnon, defend- ing Zhang, said his family had suffered greatly bec-ause he had been in prison for the past year and his business, the Blossom Garden takeaway in Ripple Road, Barking, was now leased to others.

Ian Speed, defending Xu, said she had had a tough upbringing in China and escaped the country to flee a marriage in which she had been subjected to violence and had been forced to have an abortion.

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