But weeks after the 47-year-old Hacienda Heights woman purchased the property,
bulldozers began cutting a winding course of bumps and berms into the soil,
turning the tranquil farm into a raceway for the fast-growing sport of
motocross.
Neighbors were outraged. "People move to the country for peace and quiet, not
to live next to a motorcycle track," said resident and Dallas Police Det.
Warren Martin. Local authorities, however, said there was nothing they could
do.
Then things really got racy.
On April 18, Mao was arrested in Madisonville, Texas, for allegedly heading a
multimillion-dollar prostitution and money laundering conspiracy. In a 40-count
federal indictment, the government said she hid profits from her brothels in
Inglewood, South Gate, Baldwin Park and Dallas in the East Texas property and
four other tracks she owned in California, Texas and Florida, collectively
named MX Oasis.
She has pleaded not guilty and is free on bail.
Federal prosecutors say Mao's case reveals the vast reach of global organized
crime - from prostitutes' home countries in Asia and Latin America to brothels
in Southern California and finally to farm communities in rural Texas.
But Roger Jon Diamond, the Santa Monica lawyer representing Mao, said the
government is trying to bootstrap a questionable low-level prostitution case
into a major prosecution to feed "the Bush administration pandering to its
right wing, fundamentalist, evangelical base."
"To use an old expression, they have made a federal case out of this," he said.
He also said Mao didn't know anything about any prostitution her tenants may
have conducted.
Federal action against prostitution involving foreign women "trafficked" by
brothel owners has indeed been a Bush administration priority. Justice
Department officials say they have tripled the number of sex trafficking
prosecutions since 2001.
In an operation in San Francisco and Los Angeles a year ago, hundreds of
federal agents and local police swarmed massage parlors, chiropractic offices
and apartments suspected of being brothels, arresting 45 people and detaining
150 suspected prostitutes.
No trafficking charges resulted, though two alleged San Francisco brothel
owners pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of alien harboring.
The raids led to Mao's indictment, said Assistant U.S. Atty. Carmen Luege. The
case has not produced trafficking charges either.
Ironically, what Diamond calls the "fundamentalist, evangelical base" could
aptly describe Mao. Deeply religious, according to those who know her, she
sends her teenage daughter to an evangelical Christian private school in the
San Gabriel Valley.
Federal tax records show that Mao has contributed heavily to Christian groups.
In 2004 alone, her charitable foundation donated more than $170,000, including
$40,000 to her Hacienda Heights church, Hosanna Presbyterian, and $95,000 to
MXers for Jesus, a group that holds religious services at motocross races.
Neither officials from the church nor the MXers group could be reached for
comment.
In the family-centered world of dirt bike racing, Mao was known for her
devotion to her 16-year-old son's budding amateur career.
"She was a motocross mom," said Andrew Campo, a freelance journalist who met
Mao on the racing circuit and is her spokesman.
Mao purchased a motor home to transport her son and his motorcycles to races
across the country and arranged for home-schooling to free his schedule. Her
racetracks were both a business venture and an investment in her son, Campo
said.
Campo, who lived at the Palestine track with Mao and her family most of March,
said his boss' days revolved around her son's grueling daily training, which
began with bike prep at 7 a.m., followed by morning gym workouts and riding
through much of the day. Mao prepared healthy fare for her son and other racers
in training, Campo said, and ran errands so they wouldn't be interrupted.
She also prayed a lot, said Alan McDonald, the caretaker who maintains the
track, which remains open on weekends. "She prayed for two hours straight," he
said.
McDonald, who believes that Mao is innocent, called her "the best boss I've
ever had." She offered to help pay his medical bills after his hospitalization
for a heart condition, McDonald said.
Mao charged riders $15 a head to practice their moves on weekends. Eventually,
she planned to develop a series of nationally sanctioned races, which would
draw thousands of spectators to her tracks, Campo said, and build lodging at
the tracks for the spectators.
Prosecutor Luege said these businesses "would not stand on their own. If you
shut off the illegal income, the businesses would not survive."
On top of the purchase price, Mao "must have spent $50,000 to $80,000 getting
the track ready," said Charles E. Dickens, a jewelry store owner whose cattle
graze next to Mao's track. "I know how much it costs to lease the earth-movers
and equipment. I'm a businessman. It just didn't make sense to me."
The government, in its indictment and a 74-page search warrant affidavit,
alleged that the real source of the money for the tracks were six brothels Mao
owned in Southern California, including a tanning and foot salon and a massage
parlor in Inglewood, two health clubs in South Gate and a massage parlor in
Baldwin Park.
Mao hid her involvement through elaborate fronts, the government alleged. Three
others charged with her - Edward Lutt, Charles E. Fields and Randall Johnson -
posed as owners of the businesses while funneling the bulk of earnings to Mao,
according to the affidavit.
All have pleaded not guilty and, along with Mao, are awaiting trial in
February.
In 2002, for instance, Randall Johnson, the legal owner of Health Therapy in
Baldwin Park, reported making $29,000 in profits, while paying Mao $550,000 in
"consulting fees," according to the indictment.
The pattern was repeated by the other businesses, authorities contend. From
2000 to 2005, Mao's firm, ZNC Plaza Inc., received $6.6 million in "royalty
payments" or consulting fees from the businesses owned by Lutt, Fields and
Johnson, the government alleged.
In 1988, Mao was charged with pimping and conspiracy, and in 1995 she was
charged in Los Angeles County with keeping a house of ill fame. Diamond said
she was not convicted on any of the charges.
According to a search warrant affidavit filed in the current case, a woman at
one of Mao's buildings told an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent that
Mao had confided that she once worked as a prostitute. Diamond denied the
allegation.
The lawyer compared Mao's situation to a hypothetical case of vendors at
Staples Center selling beer to underage customers. "Should Jerry Buss or Donald
Sterling be held responsible?" Diamond asked, referring to the owners of the
Lakers and Clippers. "It's possible there was an isolated act of hanky-panky"
at Mao's properties, Diamond said, but "that doesn't make the whole enterprise
illegal."
Meanwhile, Mao's website, http://www.mxoasis.com , has announced that her group
has been able to "work through" events "better fit for a Hollywood blockbuster"
and refocus on the "original vision." Motorcyclists are still gunning around
the Palestine track as federal authorities and Mao contest whether the property
can be seized as the fruit of the alleged prostitution.
Anderson County Sheriff Greg Taylor and others in Palestine don't care about
the particulars of the federal case against Mao, as long as the track is shut
down.
"It'll suit me just fine," Taylor said. "My problems will be solved."
