WILLMAR, Minn.  — The Willmar business owner arrested last weekend in an alleged assault at her massage business has been charged with inducing a woman into prostitution.

Ying He, 55, made her first court appearance Tuesday in Kandiyohi County District Court on charges of inducing a a female employee to engage in prostitution at her massage business in Willmar, a felony offense. A gross misdemeanor charge of running a disorderly house and a misdemeanor fifth-degree assault charge also were filed against her.

Minnesota statute defines a disorderly house as a location where habitual violations of the law occur, which could include prostitution, sale or possession of controlled substances, gambling or unauthorized sale of liquor.

Judge Melissa Listug set $150,000 bail with no conditions. Conditional bail was set at $50,000, including the conditions that He have no contact with the victim and turn in her passport within three hours after her release.

She remained in custody as of Friday at the Kandiyohi County Jail. Her next scheduled court appearance is for a remote hearing on March 20.

According to the criminal complaint, Willmar police were dispatched March 9 to a business in the 2400 block of First Street South. The owner was waving the officer down outside, but the 911 caller was said to be inside the business.

The caller, the woman from California, was sitting on the floor of the business and appeared to be crying. She told the officer through an interpreter that He, her boss, had confined her in a small room within the building, would not let her eat or drink or turn on lights, and would not allow her to leave.

She advised the officer that she had flown to Minnesota from California on March 3 and had been living inside the business since then. She alleged that He would lock her inside a small room every day whenever there was no business appointments.

According to the complaint, the woman told the officer that she had given a 30-minute massage to a customer that day and when the customer asked for more work to be done, He became upset with her and punched her on the head. She further stated that she felt dizzy and had a headache.

The woman was transported to the hospital via ambulance for treatment of minor injuries.

At the hospital, she told a detective that she had been in Willmar for approximately one week after she found employment through an agency based in Los Angeles.

According to the complaint, she paid the agency $100 and was told her flight to Minnesota would cost about $630. She advised she paid for half of her flight ticket and He, her new boss, paid for the other half and arranged an Uber to bring her to Willmar from the airport.

The woman told police that He controlled her movements and she was forced to begin working the day after she arrived. She further stated He told her to do “whatever the customer wanted her to do.”

The woman alleged He told her to perform sex acts on customers, clarifying that “small jobs” meant masturbating the customer, and “big jobs” meant having intercourse with the customer.

According to the complaint, when the woman refused to do as instructed, He got mad at her and allegedly threatened that she would find her if she tried to leave. He allegedly described her own boss in Los Angeles as a lawyer who worked for the courts.

When He spoke to the responding officer, she denied hitting the woman and said the woman had yelled at her and tried to hit her with a water bottle, according to the complaint.

She told police the woman was driving customers away because she did not know how to do massages. She told the officer she wanted the woman to leave and denied forcing her to live there, according to the complaint.

Police later returned to He’s business and viewed surveillance video. According to the complaint, the video shows an interaction between the woman and He in a hallway outside a client room that an adult male was seen entering.

It is unclear what the interaction was about, according to the complaint, but the two women passed each other and the video shows that He punches the woman on her head and punches her a second time before the woman starts walking away.

After reviewing the video, officers placed He under arrest.

According to the complaint, law enforcement seized eight different cellphones along with business ledgers and DNA swabs from inside the business while executing a search warrant.

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