A Portland woman has filed a civil lawsuit claiming she was sexually assaulted during a massage at Vivi Massage inside Lloyd Center, and that mall managers and the shop’s owner let an unlicensed worker deal with customers. The complaint, brought under a pseudonym by a 23-year-old Portland resident, seeks a jury trial with damages capped at $9 million. It also references a separate reported assault at the same business on June 16, 2024, one week before the incident the plaintiff says occurred on June 23, 2024.
According to KATU, the suit, filed on June 8, 2026, names as defendants Xianquan Wu, who worked at Vivi Massage, owner Wei Zhang, several real-estate management companies and the Lloyd Center property manager. The complaint again asks that a jury set the amount of any recovery, not to exceed $9 million.
The filing states that Wu "did not have a massage therapy license with the Oregon State Board of Massage Therapists," and records obtained by KATU show Portland police arrested Wu on June 23, 2024, the same day the plaintiff says she was assaulted. The suit argues the owner may have known Wu lacked a license but still allowed him to work on customers.
Statewide crackdown raises stakes
The lawsuit lands at a time when Oregon has been ramping up its efforts against illicit massage operations, a sector advocates say has expanded quickly in recent years. As reported by Willamette Week, lawmakers approved House Bill 3819 in 2025, boosting fines, allowing the Board of Massage Therapists to post warning signs on illegal shops and increasing penalties for repeat unlicensed businesses.
Landlords, leases and liability
The suit claims the Lloyd Center’s owners and managers failed to inspect the space for unreasonable dangers and did not confirm that Vivi Massage workers were properly licensed. Those allegations track with prosecutors’ growing interest in landlords and facilitators in illicit-massage cases, where the question often becomes who should have pulled the plug sooner. Prosecutors say turning ads, leases and payments into courtroom-ready evidence is time-intensive, which helps explain why enforcement can lag even after new laws are on the books.
Legal analysts note that negligence and premises-liability claims like these usually turn on whether property owners knew, or reasonably should have known, about dangerous or illegal conduct on-site. The case is expected to move through the usual rounds of filings and discovery. If it survives early attempts to throw it out, lease agreements, hiring paperwork and internal emails could all end up under a microscope in front of a jury.
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