The madame of the brothel network that operated in the suburbs of Boston and Washington D.C. will spend four years in prison.

Prosecutor Lindsey Weinstein asked for six years in prison for Han “Hanna” Lee, of Cambridge, for the “staggering”  arrangement “in which she made millions off of other women.”

Lee was indicted on charges of conspiracy to commit, persuade, induce, and coerce one or more individuals to travel interstate or foreign commerce to engage in prostitution and, count two, money laundering conspiracy. The Korean national is also subject to deportation.

Judge Julie E. Kobick on Wednesday in federal court in Boston sentenced Lee to four years in prison for being what Kobick described as “the leader” of the “extensive” and “sophisticated” network and money laundering scheme.

Lee, when she pleaded guilty last September, insisted that while she ran a criminal enterprise, “it is not a fact that I controlled these women” and that the sex workers she employed joined and stayed in the operation under “their own free will.” She continued this theme at sentencing, when she described herself as someone who cared about her workers and tried to make the job, which she herself worked for years, easier.

“Those workers who I love in that kind of business, they usually have a bad background, and every worker has their own stories. Some were abused, some husbands abused them,” she said through an interpreter. “I heard all those stories and I tried to help them.”

According to federal prosecutors, Lee recruited Korean women to work as prostitutes in her network of apartments in Cambridge, Watertown and in the Virginia suburbs of D.C.

Lee’s alleged co-brothel operators Junmyung Lee and James Lee, who prosecutors say are not related, have also pleaded guilty for their roles.

But while the operators’ cases are coming to their ends, the cases against their alleged customers are only just beginning.

The first round of probable cause hearings happened on Friday, with the Cambridge District Court clerk magistrate finding probable cause to issue criminal complaints against all 12, though only two of them showed up to the hearing.

In all, authorities sought criminal complaints against 28 alleged sex buyers, which means there are 16 more left to go through probable cause hearings. Those hearings are scheduled for the next two Fridays.

This is a developing story.