Prostitution defendants appear in court
The three women arrested in the Ailian Chen Chinese Massage parlor prostitution bust earlier this month all waived their right to a preliminary hearing Friday morning.
Di Xu, Jing Wang and Ailian Chen arrived at Cranberry District Judge David Kovach's courtroom Friday, each represented by a private attorney, in a case that Kovach called “strange.”
“There's a lot that's strange about this to say the least,” he said. “We had witnesses talked to in the hallway ... I'm glad to have this moved out of my courtroom.”
Before the hearing, an unidentified man in a blue suit approached Wang in the hallway.
Kovach reduced the bail of Xu and Wang from $250,000 to $25,000 each, and prosecutors withdrew the charge of possession of an instrument of a crime for each of them.
The women had not been cooperating with the investigation, said Kovach.
A full report will appear in the Cranberry Eagle.