Closure of Brothel Next to School Ends Protesters’ Decades-Long Fight

Inside the Swedish Salon massage parlor a sign warned prostitutes not to parade outdoors in skimpy clothes because “school was back in session.”

For three decades, a chain-link fence is all that separated the children at Pomona’s Abraham Lincoln Elementary School from the parlor.

Youngsters with curious eyes would sometimes get an early lesson in sex education. School officials said condoms and crumpled pornographic magazines would blow across the playground on the campus, which surrounds the brothel on three sides.

Not anymore. The house of ill repute is now closed, and the land at 1293 N. Garey Ave. will be turned over to the school.

“It is rare as a prosecutor you can do something so positive for the community,” said Gail Ehrlich, the deputy district attorney who prosecuted the case.

Owners Herschel H. Jennings, 65, of Alta Loma and his wife, Kay, 64, of Apple Valley agreed to give up the salon masquerading as a massage parlor and pleaded no contest Wednesday to a handful of prostitution-related charges. In return, the prosecutor agreed to dismiss multiple charges of conspiracy, pimping and tax evasion involving two businesses, the Garey salon and the Pomona Valley Health Spa.

A sign saying “MASSAGE Swedish Salon” outside the stucco bungalow greets motorists on the San Bernardino Freeway going toward downtown Pomona.

“I think it is a victory for the entire city,” said Pomona Mayor Eddie Cortez. “It’s been an ongoing problem for 25 years, since my children attended the school. I’ve had grandchildren and great-grandchildren attend the school.”

Cortez, elected in 1993, said that before he was mayor he was a parent and grandparent picketing and protesting the salon.

“We tried every kind of protest to get them to leave,” he said. “It will be an honor to knock the place down.”

Cortez said the owners even “tried to lie and say I was a former customer. But I wasn’t about to back off.”

Pomona Unified board President Nancy McCracken said: “The children at Lincoln couldn’t get a better gift for the new year. It wasn’t an easy neighbor to have. The first thing the school custodian did every day was clear the playground of the tools of the trade that would float over the fence.”

When the Swedish Salon opened in 1971, the school was a short distance from it. But community objections grew over the years as the school added a parking lot and playgrounds that moved children closer and closer to the business. One Lincoln principal seeking to shield youngsters added black strips of plastic to the chain-link fence, school officials said.

“It took a very creative prosecutor and smart bunch of [Pomona police] detectives to do what their predecessors could not, and shut the salon down for good,” said McCracken, a 20-year school board member and Lincoln graduate. “Everyone knew it was there. But no one managed to prove it.”

After a yearlong police investigation, a county grand jury indicted the couple in February on multiple counts of conspiracy, pimping and tax evasion.

Ehrlich said the investigation was more comprehensive than most efforts to stop prostitution.

Usually, police send undercover officers as customers and arrest prostitutes, she said. But the Swedish Salon’s elaborate member registration made it difficult for police to make arrests.

To make the case, detectives performed surveillance and served extensive search warrants on the businesses, the couple’s homes and their bank accounts, which uncovered piles of cash and revealing documents.

“We found a way to attack houses of prostitution and actually close them down,” said Det. Fred Robison, who led the investigation.

Ehrlich said investigators, with the help of the state Franchise Tax Board, were able to determine tax evasion based on the prostitutes’ tax returns.

Of the $50 charge, prostitutes received $5 while the Jennings kept $45, she said. The women also accepted tips that could be as much as the base price.

The business “made millions [of dollars] over the years,” Ehrlich said.

Customers and prostitutes testified before the grand jury during a monthlong hearing, she said.

Kay Jennings’ attorney, Richard Beada, said his client did what was in her best interests.

“You’ve got a little old man and a little old lady who’ve been running a business for 30 years, and they’ve now been forced out of business by government,” he said. “You think they survived by accident? It’s human nature. People frequent these places and always will. It’s part of life.”

The couple are scheduled to be sentenced March 22. Under the terms of the plea agreement, they must pay $59,400 to the Franchise Tax Board in back taxes.

Herschel Jennings will receive a three-year suspended state sentence and one year in jail. His wife will perform 1,000 hours of community service.

Under the agreement, they will keep the Pomona Valley Spa building, at 1567 N. Orange Grove Ave.

“Because of the nature of the convictions, they won’t be even able to run a legal massage parlor,” Ehrlich said. “They are out of business.”

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Times staff writer Gene Maddaus contributed to this report.