photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

A Lawrence Police Department patrol vehicle is pictured June 28, 2022.

A woman was arrested Friday in connection with the search of a local massage parlor.

Around 10 a.m., detectives with the Lawrence Police Department executed a search warrant of Tea Spa Massage, 2223 Louisiana St., said LPD spokesperson Laura McCabe in an email to the Journal-World on Sunday.

McCabe said the search was part of an ongoing investigation into the business and directed questions to the Douglas County District Attorney’s Office.

According to the Douglas County Jail booking log, Mau Chun Wong, 59, of Flushing, New York, was booked into the jail around 1:08 p.m. Friday on suspicion of selling sexual relations. She was released on a $500 cash or surety bond later that day.

According to its website, Tea Spa Massage offers a “traditional Chinese massage” in a “very clean, comforting private space” from “beautiful Asian masseuses.”

Tea Spa Massage was previously tied to the federal trial of Robert J. Gross. According to a 2020 news release from the United States Attorney’s Office of the Western District of Missouri, Gross visited Tea Spa Massage in October 2017, but when asked to leave by an employee “Gross took all of his clothes off and walked around the business completely naked, harassing and threatening the employee.”

Gross was under indictment at the time for aggravated sexual battery and was placed under surveillance by law enforcement after the massage parlor incident. He was seen by investigators purchasing multiple pairs of handcuffs and multiple firearms before his arrest in December of 2017.

On May 15, 2019, Gross was convicted in federal court of two counts of stalking victims across state lines, three counts of being a felon in possession of a firearm, and three counts of receiving a firearm while under indictment and sentenced to 35 years in federal prison without parole, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office of Western Missouri. The conviction stemmed from the investigation that began in Lawrence.

Editor’s note: This story has been corrected to show the time of the arrest Friday.