Published 3 hours ago
Updated 37 min ago
Seow Bei Yi
SINGAPORE - It was close to 5am on Wednesday (May 17) at Jalan Besar Road and all was quiet, save for a flurry of activity in the lobby of a hotel.
A police raid was underway.
A few plainclothes officers stood in the reception checking the guest list while their colleagues interviewed customers. More officers were upstairs, combing most of the 70 rooms.
A distant thumping of doors could be heard coming from the upper floors.
More than an hour later, 23 women and a man were arrested, for their alleged involvement in vice activities, under the Women’s Charter.
All are believed to be sex workers.
The police said that those involved had allegedly made use of their stay in Singapore on valid work passes to commit vice-related offences.
Preliminary investigations showed that they had been advertising their sexual services on online platforms and vice websites.
Potential customers could book their services through mobile phone numbers or email addresses provided.
The Straits Times understands that those arrested are mostly Thai nationals, aged between 20 and 33. The man who was nabbed is transgender.
When The Straits Times visited two of the rooms where the women had been rounded up in small groups by the police on Wednesday, the women were handcuffed to one another. They hid their faces from the media.
Condoms and lubricant were among the items found in the rooms.
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