Meet the landlord housing accused Flushing brothels

A wealthy banker owns half of the buildings on Flushing’s 40th Road that are allegedly housing brothels.

Business owners identified eight addresses on the block as houses of prostitution, four of which are owned by father and son Jentai and Eugene Morimoto Tsai’s Asia Plaza Corp, according to the New York Post. Representatives for the family said they did not know what the building’s tenants were doing.

The buildings include 135-20, 135-32, 135-28 and 135-24 40th Road, all of which have faced legal issues over the years. Police officers made eight arrests at 135-32 40th Road, and a prostitute jumped to her death there in 2017 to avoid a sting from the NYPD. All three of the other addresses have been hit with violations for operating illegal massage parlors, and the police filed nuisance abatement cases against 135-32 and 135-20 40th Road as well.

Tsai’s wife Kay Morimoto, who works as a bookkeeper for Asia Plaza Corp, told the Post that her husband is trying to get rid of the tenants, but doing so is proving difficult.

“They tried to evict them. It’s a very difficult thing,” she said. “Those people are very tricky. Once they lease it, they do all kinds of stuff, and I guess Mr. Tsai has a headache over it.” [NYP] – Eddie Small