Two unemployed women and one male laborer were released on citations Wednesday after they were arrested on prostitution charges stemming from a posting on Craigslist, authorities said.

Jeffrey Colin Stewart, 50, of Newhall, was arrested on suspicion of supervising prostitution. Liqing Fang, 46, of Santa Clarita, and Ming Zhu Li, 47, of Pasadena, were arrested on suspicion of prostitution.

The arrests took place at an undisclosed location between 7:30 p.m. and 9:15 p.m. Tuesday. The case remains under investigation.

Lt. Brenda Cambra of the Santa Clarita Valley Sheriff’s Station said the arrests had no connection to a two-year, ongoing investigation into local illegal massage businesses.

Since 2008, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department’s Major Crimes Bureau conducted 58 undercover enforcement operations at massage businesses throughout Santa Clarita, resulting in about 20 arrests for prostitution and 30 for licensing violations.

Also, a multi-agency task force targeted 28 massage establishments operating within the city of Santa Clarita for potential labor, licensing and code violations in November 2009.

As a result of the task force inspection, seven establishments were found to be operating without proper business licenses, nine were found to be in violation of Santa Clarita municipal codes and were issued citations. Ten were not in compliance with current building codes, and 14 were found to be in violation of the state labor code, which may result in the levying of substantial fines.

Five locations were ordered to close, and 13 business owners were subjected to additional state compliance audits.