New Acupressure Businesses Are Banned in Inglewood : Crime: City officials are investigating five firms, which they say may be fronts for prostitution.

The Inglewood City Council Tuesday adopted an emergency ordinance to temporarily ban the issuance of permits for new acupressure businesses, which city officials say may be fronts for prostitution.

The moratorium, approved 4 to 0, went into effect immediately. It is intended to allow the city time to investigate the practices of five acupressure businesses operating in Inglewood, while preventing new ones from opening, city officials said.

Four of the five acupressure operations opened late last year, and there are four others waiting for approval of their business license applications, according to business licensing officials.

Under existing zoning regulations, firms offering therapeutic acupressure have been classified as medical in nature, similar to chiropractic or acupuncture facilities. Acupressure differs from acupuncture in that it involves the manipulation of pressure points through massage, rather than the use of needles.

Inglewood Police Sgt. Richard Little said police arrested two women at one of the acupressure sites in late December on suspicion of solicitation. The facility is still under investigation, police said.

The businesses are in the central and western part of the city.

Little said there has been an influx of acupressure businesses in Inglewood following recent crackdowns on them in surrounding communities by the Los Angeles Police Department and Sheriff’s Department.

“If they are doing anything other than acupressure, then they won’t be here,” Mayor Edward Vincent said of the firms. “If they are prostitution houses, they won’t be here. If they are selling dope, they won’t be here. If they are doing anything other than what they got their business license to do, they won’t be here, and you can count on it.”

Wilford Johnson, owner of Oriental Acupressure, said he has been in business seven years and is legitimate.

“Whatever someone else might be doing I don’t want to know about,” Johnson said. “I have my own business. We are legitimate.”

A public hearing will be held in March on extending the moratorium, possibly for as long as two years.

No one representing the acupressure businesses appeared at the council session, though a lawyer for the landlord of one of the businesses said the business that operates from his client’s building is legitimate.