Shuttered Sayville Motor Lodge sold for $2M, federal prosecutors say

The shuttered Sayville Motor Lodge, where federal prosecutors say sex trafficking and drug dealing ran rampant, has been sold to a private company for $2 million in a sale facilitated by federal authorities after the owners and operators of the motel were arrested last year on conspiracy and drug charges.

U.S. District Judge Joanna Seybert approved the court-ordered sale last month. The sale’s proceeds will be used to pay the property’s prior lenders and the remaining funds are earmarked for government forfeiture.

Prosecutors did not identify the entity that purchased the shuttered motel, but in a news release called it “a company that is partially owned by a principal of a neighboring business with long-standing ties to the community.” It’s unclear how the property will be redeveloped.

“As a result of this sale, the Sayville Motor Lodge is no longer ground zero of an insidious moneymaker for prostitution and narcotics trafficking, and a blight on the surrounding community,” said U.S. Attorney Breon Peace, of the Eastern District of New York, whose office facilitated the sale. “Instead, the property will be repurposed by its new owner for the benefit of the residents of Long Island.”

The Town of Islip shuttered the motel last November when federal prosecutors charged the following individuals with sex trafficking conspiracy: Narendarakuma Dadarwala, 77, his wife, Shardaben Dadarwala, 70, their son, Jigar Dadarwala, 45, who all lived at the motel; Ashokbhai Patel, 59, a former employee who lives in Omaha, Nebraska; Timothy Bullen, 36, of Bay Shore and Michael Johnson, 34, of Selbyville, Delaware.

The Dadarwalas, Patel, and Himanshu, Inc., which did business as the Sayville Motor Lodge, were also charged with managing a drug premise. Narendarakuma Dadarwala was charged with distribution of proceeds of prostitution and narcotics businesses.

Their cases are pending and no trial dates have been set.

Officials for the Town of Islip did not return a phone call seeking comments on the sale.

North Babylon-based defense attorney William D. Wexler, who represents Narendarakuma Dadarwala, who has owned and operated the motel with his wife since 1984, did not immediately return a message seeking comment Tuesday.

From approximately 2014 until 2018, Bullen allegedly operated a sex trafficking business out of the motel, in coordination with the Dadarwalas and Patel, who prosecutors said were aware that prostitution was taking place and warned the traffickers and their victims when law enforcement was present at the motel. At least one trafficking victim was a minor, prosecutors said. Johnson allegedly operated a sex trafficking business out of the motel from about 2018 to 2020.

Prosecutors said Narendarakuma Dadarwala allegedly wired the funds received from renting rooms where sex and drugs trafficking took place to his son and Patel, prosecutors said.

Jigar Dadarwala also allegedly sold crack at the motel and brokered sexual liaisons between customers and women, often taking a cut of the proceeds, prosecutors said.

The traffickers, sex workers and drug dealers called the husband-and-wife owners “Ma” and “Pa” during their frequent interactions, prosecutors said.

Bullen and Johnson “routinely subjected” the trafficking victims to “mental and physical violence,” prosecutors said, and “kept the women who worked for them addicted to drugs and introduced them to prostitution in exchange for drugs.”

The Dadarwalas, Patel, and Himanshu, Inc., also allegedly profited from the narcotics trafficking that was conducted openly on the motel property since 2014, allegedly allowing customers to “freely use drugs, including heroin, cocaine and crack cocaine, in plain view and in motel rooms,” prosecutors said.

Attorneys for the other defendants could not be reached.

By Nicole Fuller

nicole.fuller@newsday.com@NicoleFuller

Nicole Fuller is Newsday's senior criminal justice reporter. She began working at Newsday in 2012 and previously covered local government.