Worldwide Prostitution Enterprise Raided in Brooklyn
by Ryan Thompson (court@brooklyneagle.net), published online 03-06-2008
VIP Escorts Charged up to $30,000 a Day
By Ryan Thompson
Brooklyn Daily Eagle
BROOKLYN – Federal agents raided three Brooklyn locations Thursday and arrested four individuals believed to be the leaders of an international prostitution ring that catered to some of the richest men in the city.
The IRS and FBI joint-investigation also yielded a million-dollar money-laundering scheme.
Servicing clients in New York, Los Angeles, Miami, and Paris, the Emperors Club employed model-esque escorts who charged anywhere from $1,000 to $3,100 per hour, based on each particular woman’s diamond rating. The alleged prostitutes, with names like Sienna, Maya and Chrissy, are awarded a rank anywhere from three to seven diamonds, and their respective “fees vary according to individual education, sophistication and ambience created by each of our models,” according to the Emperors Club online site.
Calls made to the Emperors Club in New York, Los Angeles and Miami were not returned, and only hours after federal agents alerted the Brooklyn Daily Eagle to Thursday morning’s raid did the web site get deconstructed and removed from the internet.
Also featured on the internet site, along with the sultry and glamorous photographs of the escorts’ bodies, were modern-art portfolios and money-investment links. It is unclear if the art and investment sections were simply a front for the alleged prostitution ring or if the Emperors Club also did business in these legitimate areas of interest.
However, according to federal agents, the Emperors Club prostitution ring concealed the illegal nature of the business by accepting monetary proceeds in U.S. bank accounts on behalf of front companies such as QAT Consulting Group, Inc. and QAT International, Inc. This activity is the basis for the money-laundering charges that the two alleged Emperors Club bosses, Mark Brener and Cecil Suwal, were arrested for.
If convicted of the money-laundering conspiracy charges, Brener, 62, and Suwal, 23, both of New Jersey, face a maximum of 20 years in prison. They additionally face a possible sentence of five years in prison if convicted of the conspiracy to violate the federal prostitution statutes, which Temeka Rachelle Lewis and Tanya Hollander also face.
Lewis, 32, of Brooklyn, and Hollander, 36, of Rhinebeck, are believed to be the booking agents who coordinated the illicit activities between the prostitutes and the clients. All four of the defendants were expected to be arraigned in U.S. District Court in Manhattan Thursday.
© Brooklyn Daily Eagle 2008
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