CHICAGO — A former massage therapist at a luxury hotel spa in River North has pleaded guilty to sexually abusing women who came to him for services. Joseph Mitchell, 34, received a seven-year sentence, but with good behavior and credit for wearing an ankle monitor at home, he will not spend any time in prison.
The allegations sparked a federal lawsuit by the women against Chuan Spa at the Langham Hotel Chicago, 330 North Wabash, that ended with a $2.2 million settlement, according to court records.
Prosecutors said Mitchell, who was fired after the women’s complaints surfaced, had been accused of inappropriately touching women in two previous jobs, but the earlier allegations never resulted in criminal charges.
The lawyers who represented the women claimed the Langham “ignored the prior complaints of sexual assault [by] continuing to employ Mitchell and even rehiring him after firing him due to the COVID-19 pandemic.”
The victims and a group of coworkers were in Chicago from Tennessee to celebrate with a client when they went to the Langham’s spa for services in September 2020, prosecutors said. One of the women, 42, planned the trip and arranged for everyone to enjoy a spa day at the Chuan Spa.
She told Chicago police that a therapist who identified himself as “Joseph” rubbed mud on her private areas with his bare hands without consent. She later drifted in and out of sleep during a massage, prosecutors said, but she remembered feeling the therapist touch her private areas and woke up on her back, uncovered and exposed, prosecutors said.
The other woman, 34, reported Mitchell reaching under a towel covering her private areas and using his hands during her mud wrap and massage. Hotel and spa policy requires therapists to use a brush during the mud treatment, as is customary, prosecutors said.
Officials said that both women quickly shared their experiences with others and reported the allegations to the hotel about a week later. The hotel confronted Mitchell and fired him.
Chicago police detectives learned that a woman made similar allegations against Mitchell when he worked as a massage therapist at a high-end fitness club downtown, prosecutors said. They said he was also accused of touching a female coworker inappropriately while they were applying for jobs at a massage service chain. The women’s law firm said the businesses were the East Bank Club and Massage Envy.
Power Rogers LLP represented the women, yielding a $1.2 million settlement for one of them and a $1 million settlement for the other, according to the law firm.
Mitchell pleaded guilty this week to two counts of aggravated criminal sexual abuse and one count of aggravated battery in a public place. Judge Jennifer Coleman sentenced him to seven years for the sexual abuse charges with a concurrent three-year term for the battery.
Per state, those sentences were automatically reduced by 50%. Because Mitchell wore an ankle monitor at home for nearly four years while awaiting trial, earning day-for-day credit toward his prison sentence, he will not be required to serve any prison time.
