Since at least July 2020, prosecutors allege that Han Lee, 41, James Lee, 68, and Junmyung Lee, 30, ran brothels that advertised primarily Asian women under the guise that they were nude models selling their services to professional photographers. The three were charged with conspiracy to coerce and entice to travel to engage in illegal sexual activity.

The brothels’ clients, which prosecutors allege could number in the hundreds, also included tech and pharmaceutical executives, doctors, professors, lawyers, scientists and accountants, according to court filings, which did not name any of the alleged clients. “Pick a profession; they’re probably represented in this case,” said acting U.S. attorney for Massachusetts Joshua Levy at a news conference Wednesday. “They are the men who fueled this commercial sex ring.”

The clients, an affidavit alleges, paid the defendants as much as $600 to engage in sexual activities with women whose nude or semi-nude pictures, height, weight and other identifying features were advertised on two purported modeling websites. The women would meet their customers at one of nine locations, where monthly rent was as high as $3,664, according to the affidavit. The brothels were located in Cambridge and Watertown, Mass., and Fairfax and Tysons, Va., the affidavit stated.

The allegations mirror a sex service that for 13 years catered to Washington’s political elite, including a sitting senator. Known as the D.C. Madam, Deborah Jeane Palfrey was convicted of running that operation in 2008. Records of her ring included the names of 815 clients, and in 2016, Palfrey’s former lawyer said her phone records “could be relevant” to the presidential election. A judge later blocked the release of those records.