Prostitutes fight back against harassment

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TE!L THEM TO STUFF IT! IN June this year, for the first time, a woman pleaded 'not guilty' to soliciting in Argyle Square near King's Cross, and won. In July, the size of the local vice squad was increased.

Faced with growing police harassment, about 60 prostitutes organised by the English Collective of Prostitutes and two organisations who share the King's Cross Women's Centre - Women Against Rape and Black Women for Wages for Housework - have occupied the local church, the Holy Cross.

So what kind of police harassment has led to this action?

for the full claim Legally, if the police see a woman solicit two men, then, after cautioning her twice, they may arrest her.

But present police practice is to stop, open the car door, and say "You, you and you - in."

The police systematically choose the women they want to harass; they don't wait for evidence. Women have been arrested while going shopping, or to fetch a take-away, or the police wait outside their flats.

The day I spoke to the women in the church, there had been five such unlawtul arrests by 8 o'clock. One woman told me she had paid 50 co 15 £235 in past four fines in the weeks.

The women are demanding an end to the unlawful arrests. They want a worker seconded from the. Police and Women's Committees of the GLC, Camden and Islington to monitor police activity in Argyle Square for the next month.

Police

This is 'needed even more now the police have been provoked by the direct action.

Black women under unlawful arrest report racist abuse from most - although not all - of the police. Racist comments like 'who's TIAI19 minoar nima?' yuut mugger punp! art common.

The police use the excuse of looking for pimps to arrest husbands, boyfriends and sons - especially if they're black.

Meanwhile, real pimps who control about three quarters of the women in Argyle Square, are left alone: Only 8 pimps from the area were arrested last year.

Some pimps will even use threats to inform the police to keep control over the women. (Others just threaten to 'kneecap' the women - threats which the police ignore.) It may just be 'man to man solidarity" which inspires this co-operation but the strength of it suggests there may be more organised corruption.

The police claim to be acting in the intercsts of local residents, by fighting crime in the area.

But the police are using their own definition of residents' interests as an excuse to do what they want: local people have no control over their own police force. Residents who came into the church for services (which have now been moved) have expressed support for the prostitutes' case.

Also, as police action ignores violence against women on the streets around King's Cross, it is in fact encouraging an atmosphere in which violent crime can take places A woman, was raped in the area last week. She went to the police. They spent five hours trying to convince her she was a prostitute (and therefore didn't matter?). When she showed them a handkerchief the rapist had dropped, they weren't interested.

A rapist at large - and the police do nothing. What better encouragement to rapists could they give?

Once again, links between the police and social services are shown. Women arrested illegally, face attempts by social services to take their children into care. This is no minority problem - only one or two of the women in Argyle Square have no children.

The women demand an end to this, and a more constructive attitude from social services: guarantees of help for all women who want to get off the game.

The Heet Street press have been little help. Wo05535

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