In 2010, Ms Finch (R v Finch, Luton Crown Court) was prosecuted for “keeping/ managing a brothel” (SOA 1956). Ms Finch worked collectively with friends at her home, prioritising safety. Following an 18 month public campaign, spearheaded by the ECP, she was acquitted using what is thought to be the only successful defence of its […]
In 2010, a woman was convicted of assisting in the management of a brothel for working in a sauna in Birmingham. She worked two days a week and had only been there for six weeks. Despite her minimal involvement in the running of the premises the law on brothel-keeping is so wide-ranging that she was […]
In 2010, a woman was charged with brothel-keeping. She had decided to work with other women after she had a knife held to her throat whilst working as an escort. She had a teenage son with special needs so decided to plead guilty because she thought that was the best way to ensure that she […]
In January 2010, a Thai woman was charged with trafficking and brothel-keeping. She worked in a flat with other women where she organised the advertising and paid the rent. She and her husband had given a lift in their car to a sex worker they had known for years, from one town to another in […]
In August 2009, a woman who was working on her own from home in Tyne and Wear was charged with the archaic offences of “running a disorderly house” and “running a bawdy house under common law”. She believed she was targeted by police because she had previously reported a serious racist attack by a neighbour […]
(Minister of State, Alan Campbell, Hansard 19 January 2009) In April 2009, a woman (Ms W) was charged under section 33 of the Sexual Offences Act 1956 (SOA 1956) with “assisting in the management of a brothel” at two premises. Ms W had no responsibility for either flat. She was not a tenant, did not […]
In 2005, a Brazilian mother was convicted of trafficking and imprisoned for three years for running a working flat where other immigrant women worked. In court the judge said “none of these women were, in fact, coerced by you into acting as a prostitute . . . you treated them in a kindly and hospitable […]
In 1995, two women brought the first successful private prosecution for rape in England and Wales with the support of the English Collective of Prostitutes (ECP) and Women Against Rape (WAR). Both women had independently reported being attacked in what turned out to be remarkably similar circumstances. Yet the Crown Prosecution Service decided there was […]