USA TODAY International Edition
Spa chain dogged by assault complaints
Massage Envy protects its interests but struggles to protect its clients
“They may have a road map on how to do things from corporate. The implementation is done locally.”
Adam Horowitz
Florida attorney, about Massage Envy’s revamped safety policies
PHOENIX – Once considered an occasional spa luxury, massages have become an essential part of many people’s wellness routines – and Massage Envy, which offers lower- cost massages across the USA, has been part of that trend since its first location opened nearly 20 years ago in Scottsdale, Arizona.
The nation’s largest massage therapy chain trades on its name recognition and vigorously advertises chainwide safety claims. But when a spa gets into trouble, the parent company has been quick to point out that its outlets are individually owned franchises, over which it has little control.
Of the more than 100 sexual misconduct complaints filed since 2014 with the Arizona State Board of Massage Therapy, the regulatory and licensing body that investigates complaints, 28 of them involved Massage Envy, which has 40 locations across the company’s home state.
Kevin Ramsey, who works for the company that operates the most Massage Envy franchises in Arizona
and trains massage therapists for the chain, was appointed to a seat on the licensing board in 2019. After the USA TODAY Network asked him whether it was a conflict of interest for him to vote on the punishment of therapists from his own company, he resigned in June.
Since 2017, when a BuzzFeed article detailed numerous sexual assault complaints against Massage Envy employees, company officials said they have revamped safety policies. But a fivemonth investigation by the USA TODAY Network shows Massage Envy continues to be dogged by the same problems.
Though the company states on its website it requires franchises to do background checks on massage therapists, Arizona licensing records show at least two therapists with questionable backgrounds were hired.
A Phoenix therapist was on probation after a client complained he exposed her breast and made inappropriate sexual comments when he worked for a previous employer, and he received a second licensing complaint while working at a Massage Envy spa in 2017.
In another case, a Glendale therapist was hired by a Massage Envy spa in 2018 despite being sued for alleged sexual assault while working for a different massage company and after being investigated by police over sexual misconduct allegations while still in massage school.
Massage Envy, which has more than 1,100 franchised locations, says it is committed to the safety and well- being of its members. But it limits their legal options if they are sexually abused. Court documents detail how signing up for membership includes an agreement to settle disputes with the parent company through arbitration, rather than before a jury, unless clients opt out. Franchise employees took the side of a massage therapist against a client in a hearing before Arizona’s licensing board.
The parent company, Massage Envy Franchising, would not make anyone available for an interview. A spokesman provided a statement that the company pioneered and implemented brand standards to promote a safe, clean, professional, consistent and comfortable environment at every location.
“We take allegations of misconduct by franchisee employees very seriously and have developed our Commitment to Safety Program to outline the brand policies, protocols and actions in place at the more than 1,100 independently owned and operated franchised locations,” the statement said.
The majority of customers never file complaints or lawsuits.
Florida attorney Adam Horowitz, who has been involved in more than 50 massage therapy lawsuits – many of them against Massage Envy – described the company’s response since it revamped its safety policies in 2017 as “very uneven.”
“They may have a road map on how to do things from corporate,” Horowitz said. “The implementation is done locally.”
Some of the women in this story are not named because the USA TODAY Network does not identify without permission people who allege sexual crimes.
‘ Something happened’
Despite red flags, massage therapist Phillip Dominguez was able to get a job at a Massage Envy franchise in 2018.
Two years earlier, Dominguez was a student in the massage therapy program at Arizona College in Glendale
when a school official contacted police. Two students said Dominguez touched them inappropriately while they were getting massages in the school’s training lab.
One student refused to talk to police, saying she was afraid. The second student told police Dominguez pulled the sheet back, exposing her buttocks during a massage. A day later, she claimed he massaged her breasts. Dominguez denied the allegations. Glendale police said neither classmate wanted to prosecute, and they closed the case.
Dominguez received his Arizona massage license in April 2017. That same month, a woman accused him of sexually assaulting her during a massage at City Health Services in Phoenix. She filed a lawsuit, and as the suit worked its way through court, Dominguez began working at Massage Envy in September 2018, according to a police report.
When Dominguez was hired by Massage Envy, there were no complaints against him with the licensing board, but he was listed as a defendant in the civil lawsuit.
Two months after he started work, a woman identified as “A. C.” booked a massage with him at Massage Envy Glendale, according to a police report. She asked him to focus on her shoulders and neck. Instead, she said, he stroked her labia. She said she felt violated, frozen and unsure what to do.
A. C. said she spent the next day in bed, depressed. She told her mother and another massage therapist about what happened. She reported the incident to Massage Envy. She called Glendale police.
A. C. was shocked to learn that Dominguez had been investigated by police in 2016 when he was a student and that he had the civil lawsuit filed against him in 2017. She complained to the state licensing board.
Her complaint went before the board in 2019, where Dominguez denied the allegations. State licensing records say the Massage Envy spa fired him afterward.
“In my opinion, something happened,” the board’s vice chair, Victoria Bowmann, said during the hearing. The board concluded there was enough information to demonstrate a pattern. It revoked Dominguez’s license.
Massage Envy Glendale referred questions about Dominguez’s hiring to the corporate office, which declined to comment on specifics.
In a general statement, Massage Envy said company policy requires each franchisee to conduct background screenings for all service providers as a condition of hiring, then annually. Massage Envy uses an automated third- party system that tracks service providers’ compliance with the brand’s safety requirements. The system checks compliance in background checks, license verifications, required training completion and employment verifications.
Conflict of interest?
The Arizona State Board of Massage Therapy licenses therapists and conducts investigations and hearings into allegations of incompetence or unprofessional conduct. The board can discipline therapists, including by revoking their massage licenses.
In August 2019, the board had dwindled from five members to three because of resignations, meaning if only one member was absent, the board would lack a quorum and wouldn’t be able to hold a public meeting. Massage therapist Kevin Ramsey applied for a seat and was appointed by Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey.
Ramsey began working for PCRK Group in October 2019, according to his Linkedin account, the same month he began casting votes on the licensing board. The Phoenix- based company owns and operates more than 70 Massage Envy locations in 10 states, including several in Arizona.
Over the next 20 months, board records show, he didn’t recuse himself on eight votes involving three Massage Envy therapists – Gabriel Houseal, Samuel Cartes and Luis Martinez. None of the therapists had their licenses revoked.
An ethics expert told the USA TODAY Network that Ramsey’s votes were a conflict of interest because of his connection to Massage Envy, and he should have refrained from discussion or voting on any discipline cases involving the company.
By voting on those cases, he risked being perceived as acting on behalf of the therapists and the company that employed them, said John Pelissero, a senior scholar in government ethics at the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics at Santa Clara University.
“You are placing private interests above public interests,” he said.
Ramsey said that Massage Envy is a large company and that he didn’t know the therapists he voted on. On the one occasion he did know the therapist, he recused himself from voting, he said.
Ramsey resigned from the licensing board June 10 after the USA TODAY Network questioned him about his voting record.
‘ Numerous lawsuits’
Business entrepreneur John Leonesio and massage therapist Shawn Haycock modeled Massage Envy after fitness clubs, using a membership model that gives the company and its franchises predictable revenue. The first location opened in Scottsdale in 2002. In 2009, Entrepreneur Magazine ranked Massage Envy as one of the nation’s 20 fastest- growing franchises.
Massage Envy’s reputation was rocked in 2017 when an investigation by BuzzFeed News revealed more than 180 clients had filed sexual assault lawsuits, police reports and state board complaints against Massage Envy spas, employees and the national company.
The company responded with a sixpoint safety plan on its website, outlining how it planned to screen therapists and handle sexual assault claims.
Massage Envy Franchising, in its latest disclosure document, said the company has been named as a defendant in “numerous lawsuits” by customers who allege their massage therapists engaged in sexual misconduct. The suits allege the company was negligent and is liable. The company said it “strongly disagrees with the plaintiffs’ allegations and intends to vigorously defend these actions.”
It didn’t specify how many lawsuits.
Limited legal options
Court documents detail how Massage Envy tries to limit a customer’s right to a jury trial.
Brian Kent, a Philadelphia attorney who represents women suing Massage Envy, said the company tries to force victims into arbitration by way of a “hidden” agreement.
In Arizona, two women who claimed they were sexually abused in 2018 by a massage therapist at Massage Envy Camelback in Phoenix sued the spa, the therapist and the parent company, alleging negligence. The defendants denied the allegations.
In 2020, Massage Envy Franchising asked the judge to halt legal proceedings, arguing the women had agreed to settle disputes with the parent company through arbitration. Lawyers said the women checked the “I agree” box on iPads when they signed up for memberships. The “terms of use” included an agreement to settle all disputes with Massage Envy Franchising through arbitration.
A hyperlink to the terms gave the women the right to opt out of arbitration, provided they send written notice within 30 days to an email address that was provided. The women chose not to opt out, lawyers for Massage Envy wrote in the court filing.
Lawyers representing the women argued a reasonable user would not have known to click the hyperlink to view the document.
This year, a Maricopa County Superior Court judge granted Massage Envy Franchising’s request to force the two Arizona women into arbitration with the parent company. The women are fighting on two fronts, according to court documents: a civil lawsuit against the spa and massage therapist and arbitration with Massage Envy Franchising.
Massage Envy said in a statement it will not comment on any particular case, but it is committed to the right of victims of sexual misconduct to have their claims heard and resolved in a fair manner.
The statement said arbitration is a standard process for presenting and deciding claims.
“In addition to being widely used, it is a fair and reasonable process,” the statement said.
High- profile companies such as Uber and Lyft have removed mandatory arbitration to settle sexual harassment or assault claims and give customers the option to go to court.