D.A. Fires 1st Volley in Bathhouse Battle--Sues to Shut 3

Firing the first volley in his battle to shut down gay bathhouses in Los Angeles County, Dist. Atty. Ira Reiner Wednesday filed lawsuits against three of the establishments, claiming that they are little more than sex clubs that facilitate the spread of AIDS.

Reiner is asking that the three bathhouses--Mac’s in the Silver Lake area, the Hollywood Spa in Hollywood and the Leisure Spa and Turkish Bath in Pomona--be permanently closed because each has violated a county ban on anal and oral sex in such facilities. He was joined by County Counsel De Witt W. Clinton in bringing the Superior Court suits.

“They exist for a single purpose,” Reiner said at a news conference. “Their raison d’etre is to foster . . . multiple sex contacts for gay and bisexual men.”

A hearing on temporarily closing the facilities should be held within 30 days, and a trial to determine whether they should be permanently shut down is expected to follow within a year.

Sets Goal

Ultimately, Reiner said, “we are going to try and close every single bathhouse in Los Angeles.”

“This is just the first step,” he said.

The three bathhouses targeted in the lawsuit are among 12 in the county.

Representatives of the Leisure Spa in Pomona could not be reached for comment, but attorney Barrett Litt, who represents the owners of Mac’s and the Hollywood Spa, indicated that those two clubs will continue operating.

“They are going to remain open, and a court will decide what the legalities of this are,” Litt said.

Describing his facility as a “social club” that is “very clean, very safe, very sanitary,” Hollywood Spa owner Scott Goulet called the county’s portrayal of activities taking place there as “hogwash . . . a lie, an out and out lie.”

The court action was filed just three days after county health officials ordered the three clubs to shut down. That closure order capped a two-month undercover investigation by the county health department and the district attorney’s office.

In a 3-inch stack of declarations from police and private investigators designed to bolster the lawsuits, a portrait is painted of sex with abandon taking place inside facilities that are filthy, foul-smelling and poorly lighted.

‘Grotesque Stench’

The “grotesque stench, extreme heat” and other unsanitary conditions found inside the Pomona bathhouse prompted one investigator to vomit repeatedly during a visit there, another investigator said in court documents. Rooms were ridden with mildew, floors slimy and the patrons engaged in all-male sex orgies, the investigator declared.

At Mac’s, investigators saw “14 male couples” participating in erotic behavior in an open room. In that facility’s “orgy room,” explicit, all-male sex videos were shown to an audience of patrons engaged in sexual acts.

As in the other facilities, investigators said they saw no attempt to distribute or sell condoms to patrons, and there was little effort to educate them about AIDS.

At the Hollywood Spa, part of the basement was set aside as “The Meat Locker,” with a small opening with vertical bars on it to permit viewing of what went on inside. Group sex at the Spa also was “in plain view,” investigators said.

The attempt to close the bathhouses is not the first by county officials. Two years ago, a move by the county counsel to close three other facilities failed when a Superior Court judge ruled that there was not enough proof to conclude they posed a health threat.

To head off such a finding this time, Reiner included testimonials from 17 health experts, including county Health Director Robert C. Gates and Dr. Mervyn Silverman, president of the American Foundation for AIDS Research and the former head of San Francisco’s Public Health Department.

“An individual so inclined . . . may be able to have eight or 10, or even 15 to 20 contacts in a bathhouse setting,” Silverman said. “Bathhouses . . . have been shown to be uniquely adapted to one of the highest-risk behaviors . . . multiple sex contacts.”

In Los Angeles County, Reiner said, as many as 10,000 visits are made to the bathhouses each month, resulting in as many as 20,000 to 30,000 sexual episodes.

“No person can make a moral argument for the continued existence of these facilities,” he said. “They contribute to AIDS and AIDS kills.”