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https://filia.org.uk/news/2020/9/8/holbeck-a-case-study-of-hell

By Dr Em

Holbeck is a case study of hell. It is misogyny and objectification in the legal system, a triumph of men’s rights activists. Alan Caton, the detective who led the investigation into the murders of five prostituted women in Ipswich in 2006 and subsequently led the strategy to put an end to street prostitution in Ipswich is highly critical of the Leeds ‘managed approach’. Canton is clear that ‘I totally disagree with it’ he is of the opinion that ‘it plays right into the hands of pimps and abusers of women, and turns a blind eye to the most vulnerable people in our society. It allows men to carry on in their misogynistic ways, to abuse and exploit women who are out on the street selling sex’.1 Canton added that ‘The demand is there in this country because men are allowed unfettered to buy sex from women, to do what they want to them’.2 ‘Because that demand is never quelled, people will use all sorts of criminal avenues to traffic and exploit women. It's all about tackling that demand, telling men it's not acceptable to buy women and abuse them in that way’.3 In Holbeck human trafficking is rebranded as ‘migration for sex work’, paedophilia and child molestation becomes ‘under-age sex work’, rape becomes ‘a disputed sale’.

If one wants to know how unempowering the situation is for prostituted women and girls, one needs only read the punter reviews. Yes – reviews – like one would review a restaurant or hotel. Men describe their experiences to each other using degrading language and slang. For example, women likely trafficked from Romania are known as ‘Roms’, from Poland, ‘EE’, while men bemoan their lack of English or desire to participate, and the presence of pimps. Other men get a sexual kick out of the fact that the women and girls are disengaged. ‘Howaboutit’ related how:

‘i've had a few girls from down Holbeck - usually pass through at about 5am on a saturday morning. Always at least 1 or 2 around, as mentioned above, some are horrors!… total lack of interest while i had her in missionary.. but that kind of turns me on. Bored and checking her texts while i unload bare inside her!!’.4

One particular poster uses the moniker ‘Yorkshireripper’, referencing the serial killer Peter Sutcliffe who murdered prostituted women in Leeds during the 1970s. ‘Many of his attacks came after he had cruised the streets looking for victims, and the area’s reputation as a red light district meant that it was easier for him to persuade women to get into his car while soliciting’.5 ‘Yorkshireripper’ described one prostituted woman thus:

‘she looks a shit fuck based on that video [an uploaded porn film taken during street ‘sex work’] but I just think there's something about her being a really lowlife desperate dirty prostitute with such a shit background who's cunt has had many hundreds of hard cocks up her … that makes me want to empty my filth in her, just for the thrill of it’.6

‘Yorkshireripper’ had actually gone in search of potentially underage girls that night, he informed the other men that ‘I was seeking teenagers or under 25s’.7 ‘Yorkshireripper’ likes to negotiate the already low prices down further, he particularly likes bad weather as a means of creating more desperation in the women. He outlined how he:

‘went for a little scouting mission myself last night, first time in a few months due to reports of increased surveillance by anti whore brigade. Was a cold, wet and rainy night which is my favourite time as it seems gives you that extra cover of visibility and offers a quick respite from the cold as an incentive to the girls when your knocking down the price’.8

The women are looked upon as objects which the men can use, abuse, consume and collect. One ‘Richard1982’ described how ‘Of all the girls I've picked up she's the only one I haven't bb'd [had sex without a condom] so I want to collect the full set lol’.9 And the ‘sex work is work’ champions claim it is empowering for women. Do you feel empowered after reading that? Alan Caton, the detective who led the investigation into Stephen Wright who murdered five prostituted women in Ipswich in 2006 has related that “When I asked the [men] about it, they said: ‘I am paying for it, I can do what I want.’ That helped me form the view over time that this is not right. Men should not be able to exploit and abuse women in that way”.

DESPERATION & DRUGS

Holbeck creates a desperate cycle which we see trapping prostituted women across the world. Drugs and prostitution become a ‘chicken and egg’ problem. Women enter the trade to fund their, or their partner’s, drug addiction and then require more drugs to cope with what they are experiencing. Drugs become a means to endure male violence. While talking about Holbeck, Jenni described how she ‘gave up drugs to get out of the ‘managed’ red light zone – it was too dangerous’.11 Julie Bindel stated that in the opinion of one exited survivor of Holbeck ‘Her biggest criticism of the managed zone is the failure to offer women a route out of a world where drugs are rife’.12 Jenni discussed how “All the girls are down there because they’re dependent on drugs. I don’t believe it’s their choice to do it,” she says. “The key is to stop the drug use and it will stop the girls having to work for drugs”.13 Charles Hymas and Corinne Redfern reported how in Holbeck, it ‘was the sight of a prostitute injecting drugs into her groin on the backseat of a car in full view of residents in the neat terraced street in Beeston, Leeds, that convinced artist Claire Bentley-Smith it was time to act’.14 In 2019 'A woodland of suffering' was discovered by a mum-of-two dropping her children off at school which revealed a ‘sex worker's’ 'home' next to a Leeds primary school.15The drug litter is a constant in the area and a sharp reminder that allowing men to buy women on the street is ineffective at tackling the women’s drug addiction. In one clean-up of one small wooded area it took more than 20 vans to remove mounds of waste from a 'needle and condom hotspot' in Holbeck.16

Then men purchasing the women know they are desperate and many are addicts. One ‘Munterhunter’ said of the prostituted women in Holbeck that:

‘in most cases it's to feed a drug addiction or because some pimp is telling them "go and earn me 200 quid tonight".

I know that a large number of street prostitutes have serious drug habits my mate's wife works with a project which operates all over the UK working with street prostitutes and the biggest challenge they face is drugs. My mate is a support worker working with people on drug rehab and community punishment orders from the courts his wife works for a national organisation working with street prostitutes’.17

Yet he was undeterred from buying women. Mark Edmonds has outlined how in Holbeck, ‘there are no sanctions and no risk of conviction. Widespread drug-taking — sadly an integral part of the lives of many of these women, who have often been abused as teenagers and are subsequently used by pimps who see them as no more than a commodity — is also tolerated, under a scheme that costs local taxpayers £200,000 per year to run’.18 A BBC documentary highlighted the link between drug addiction and prostitution. In the documentary Sammie-Jo described how she ‘has been forced to work as a prostitute in the red-light district of Holbeck in Leeds to fund her addiction’.19 Yet still the ‘sex work is work’ lobby talk about women choosing this.

Safety and Violence

The ‘sex work is work’ pimp lobby and men’s sexual rights activists argue that prostitution should be decriminalised to make it safer for those being sold. Holbeck, and other examples such as in the Netherlands, shows this is false.20 It makes it more dangerous for the women being sold and other women in the area. In 2015, within months of the ‘managed approach’ zone in Holbeck becoming operational Daria Pionko was murdered by a punter.21 Julie Bindel spoke to one Holbeck prostitute who told her: ‘Because [the men] can’t get arrested, they think they can do anything they like. I’ve been raped, and one man urinated on me once and then took a photo’.22 With the first year of the ‘managed approach’ figures released by police show complaints of rape almost trebled … and have remained significantly higher than before’.23Alongside this, rapes are under-reported as the police and courts do not take it seriously, particularly if the woman is prostituted. On the 7th September 2018 Holbeck residents, David and Calum, reported stopping a rape of a prostituted woman. They stated that while walking home through Holbeck after they had finished work at a club they heard a woman’s voice calling for help. They ‘saw a man trying to strangle a woman. He released her as soon as we approached and she ran towards us… she’s a sex worker and he’s a punter. The fight was about condoms. He wanted her to have sex without a condom… but she refused’.24 The fetish killer, Donald Sheridan, who the council and probation service decided to house in the managed zone in Holbeck while he was on parole, told police in an interview regarding his abduction and attempted rape of a woman in Holbeck in 2019 that ‘he still experiences urges to rape and murder women, especially strangling them, and he had recently felt the urge to strangle an older sex worker after using her services’.25

The frequency of sex attacks on women in the small area of Holbeck was highlighted in 2019 when there were three sex attacks within 36 hours. Samantha Gildea and Kristian Johnson reported that ‘A female sex worker was assaulted by a male client in Shafton Lane on Sunday afternoon, then in the evening, a woman was grabbed on a footpath near Kenneth Street in an attempted rape at around 5.30pm. A third incident was reported to officer after a woman was physically assaulted in Holbeck Moor Park at around 10.15pm last night’.26 Julie Bindel interviewed ‘Sammy, who was pimped on her 17th birthday straight into the zone by her “boyfriend”, who told her that the police “don’t give a fuck about the women”. Sammy said that “One night I was screaming my head off when a nasty punter got really rough with me, but these two coppers just walked past’.27 Another prostituted woman, Jenni, told Chris Hymas and Bindel of ‘the constant threat of robbery, sex tourism, exploitation by traffickers, and women so desperate for drugs they sold sex for just £10’.28 Hymas and Bindel reported that ‘the zone, designed to crack down on pimping, was in reality a magnet for men seeking to exploit the women by charging them for protection’.29 Jenni described how “There were loads of young lads who were basically glorified pimps.. There were more and more attacks before I left, of people coming into the area to rob the girls, knowing they were on their own with money’30. Rather than improve relations between the prostituted woman and the police, the managed approach has caused them to deteriorate and the prostituted women feel even less protected.31 Nevertheless, ‘the council says the increase in crime is due to improved reporting and includes Beeston which is not part of the zone. Others disagree. “It was a disaster from day one,” a senior police officer told The Telegraph on condition of anonymity. “Other criminals came into the area quick as a flash. Drug dealers, pimps, even traffickers that brought the women from Romania’.32

Male violence and rape, and police inaction over these crimes, is also a problem for women and children not in prostitution who live near or enter the Holbeck zone. In 2015, ‘Sally – a young woman with learning disabilities, then aged 17 – was approached at a bus stop in Beeston on a weekday afternoon, bundled into a car, and raped in a nearby home. With DNA evidence, the attacker was quickly arrested and prosecuted in court. However, during a gruelling court case which saw Sally forced into a cross-examination, the defence lawyer argued that his client had simply mistaken Sally for a sex worker, and he walked free’.33 In 2017, Ian Staines, managing director of the Fresco Group, a local business, told the Daily Mail regarding the increase in rapes and sexual assaults that ‘these figures do not surprise me. Female members of our staff feel threatened. The police aren’t interested’.34 In 2018, a Holbeck woman was raped on her way home from work by a group of men who assumed she was a prostitute’.35 In another case of rape in the small Holbeck zone, Ed Carlisle reported of the rape of Alice, a previous victim of domestic abuse, that she had moved into a hostel in Holbeck, where she was repeatedly approached by kerb crawlers. Then in May 2018 ‘a gang of men manhandled her into a car, refused to believe she wasn’t a sex worker, and took her to a nearby house, where one of the men raped her. With DNA evidence, the attacker was quickly arrested, but again (supported by the testimonies of his friends) argued for mistaken identity, and was not even prosecuted’.36 At 4pm Saturday 8th September 2018 a resident reported that ‘my 12 year old daughter walking home from school rang me to tell me she’s just seen a lady being raped! 2 men had her pinned against the wall… one was pulling her knickers off as she screamed. My daughter ran home and I’ve called 999’.37 In November 2018 it was reported to the police and the press that a man tried to buy a baby for an hour in Holbeck. ‘The 47-year-old [woman] was carrying her four-month old grandchild in a pram in the area before the man reportedly said 'Give me an hour with it and I will bring it back'.38 In 2019 a woman claimed that while simply out walking she 'was raped in the street in Holbeck'.39 She did not report this as she thought the police would just say her rapist thought she was a ‘sex worker’ and he would thus walk free. Also in 2019 Donald Sheridan, a convicted fetish murderer, was housed in Holbeck while on parole, and later went on to abduct and strangle a woman until a passer-by intervened.40 The housing of Sheridan in Holbeck highlights how the judiciary and police view the women of Holbeck as dispensable. Susie Beever reported in 2019 how ‘many of the area's female residents feel at risk, preyed upon and "constantly scrutinised". Holbeck has one of the highest recorded crime rates in the entire Leeds South policing ward. There were 161 crimes reported in the area in September alone, of which 51 were classed as violent or sexual offences’.41/sup>

The Save Our Eyes community campaign group set up by residents of Holbeck records their experiences. One resident recorded how ‘My granddaughter was approached at 3.15pm in the afternoon in her school uniform by a punter looking for sex’.42 Another resident shared her experience of how ‘My daughter was followed home from school by a man making rude comments and trying to touch her’.43 13 year old Katy tells the story of how while waiting at a bus stop in a residential street adjoining the Holbeck managed zone on a Saturday morning with her mum ‘A man came up to us and said “Are you working?” My mum was confused and asked what he meant. He replied “Not you! I mean her. Is she working?” and pointed at me. My mum… shouted at him “She’s only 13, she’s a child!” but he wasn’t even bothered. He carried on, “It doesn’t matter about her age. She looks like one (meaning a prostitute)… It’s acceptable on Holbeck to ask”.44 Helen, Katie’s mum, described how ‘the man who wanted to buy her on Saturday argued with me. He felt he had a right to ask any woman in the area for sex’.45

Conclusion

Yet despite all of this evidence and Holbeck conforming to the pattern of other decriminalised areas of prostitution around the world in terms of an increase in crime and danger to women Chief Super Intendent Steve Cotter, of West Yorkshire Police, ‘said the force "remain convinced" the system was working’.46 One wonders how Mr Cotter defines success. Mr Cotter elaborated, that the managed approach in Holbeck ‘provides the best opportunity to safeguard the vulnerable women involved in street sex work, to limit the issues that impact on residents and businesses and to reduce the level of street sex work in Leeds," he said’.47 This is contradicted by reality. Still, a controversial report published in 2020 has claimed that the managed approach in Holbeck has had a positive result. This report’s statements are not supported by the data and the report itself ‘failed to comply with the legal obligations of public bodies to consider the equality impact of their policies and did not properly investigate how the scheme affects local women and children’.48 As Nordic Model Now asserts, ‘Prostitution has been recognized by the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women to be a form of gender-based violence – meaning that not only is prostitution inherently violent, but it is also an intrinsic part of the systemic oppression of women and girls’.49 Why would this be different in Holbeck?

N. Hyde, ‘Managed Approach 'plays into hands of pimps' says former police officer who took action after Ipswich murders’, Leeds Live (24 March 2019)

N. Hyde, ‘Managed Approach 'plays into hands of pimps' says former police officer who took action after Ipswich murders’, Leeds Live (24 March 2019), https://www.leeds-live.co.uk/news/leeds-news/managed-approach-plays-hands-pimps-15996919

Howaboutit, ‘Leeds’, Bare Punting (Mon Oct 08, 2018 2:48 pm) Barepunting.net

G. Newton, ‘The Yorkshire Ripper Files: Why Chapeltown in Leeds was the ‘hunting ground’ of Peter Sutcliffe’, Yorkshire Post (26 March 2019), https://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/news/crime/yorkshire-ripper-files-why-chapeltown-leeds-was-hunting-ground-peter-sutcliffe-1757731

Yorkshireripper, ‘Leeds’, Bare Punting (Wed Dec 26, 2018 5:25 am)

Ibid.

Yorkshireripper, ‘Leeds’, Bare Punting (Wed Nov 21, 2018 2:28 pm), Barepunting.net

Richard1982, ‘Leeds’, Bare Punting (Thu Nov 29, 2018 6:29 pm), Barepunting.net

C. Hymas & C. Redfern, ‘Violence, drugs and sexual diseases: How managed zones for prostitution are failing women worldwide’, The Telegraph (23 July 2018), https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/women-and-girls/violence-drugs-sexual-diseases-managed-zones-prostitution-failing/

C. Hymas & J. Bindel, ‘I gave up drugs to get out of the ‘managed’ red light zone – it was too dangerous’, The Telegraph (21 November 2018), https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/women-and-girls/gave-drugs-get-managed-red-light-zone-dangerous/

C. Hymas & C. Redfern, ‘Violence, drugs and sexual diseases: How managed zones for prostitution are failing women worldwide’, The Telegraph (23 July 2018), https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/women-and-girls/violence-drugs-sexual-diseases-managed-zones-prostitution-failing/

K. Johnson, ‘'A woodland of suffering' - Shocking pictures reveal sex worker's 'home' next to Leeds primary school’, Leeds Live (9 June 2019), https://www.leeds-live.co.uk/news/leeds-news/gallery/a-woodland-suffering-shocking-pictures-16399919

N. Hyde, ‘Over 150 used needles and 200 condoms found in Holbeck 'hotspot’’, Leeds Live (16 October 2018), https://www.leeds-live.co.uk/news/leeds-news/over-150-used-needles-200-15285414

Munterhunter’, ‘Holbeck Red Light District Leeds’, UK Punting (14 February 2018, 09:46 am), https://www.ukpunting.com/index.php?topic=184124.0

M. Edmonds, ‘Dark heart of Britain's only 'legal' red light district’, Daily Mail (25 July 2020), https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8558667/Dark-heart-Britains-legal-red-light-district.html

‘BBC Show Highlights the Need for Drug Rehab to Overcome Addiction’, UK Addiction Treatment Centres (7 March 2017), https://www.ukat.co.uk/drugs/rehab-treatment/bbc-show-highlights-need-drug-rehab-overcome-addiction/

J. Bindel, ‘The red light district of Amsterdam could soon be a distant memory – here's why’, Independent (13 February 2018), https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/amsterdam-red-light-district-failing-prostitution-sex-work-decriminalisation-doesn-t-work-holland-a8206511.html

‘Daria Pionko death: Lewis Pierre jailed for murder’, BBC News (5 July 2016), https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-leeds-36713608

M. Edmonds, ‘Dark heart of Britain's only 'legal' red light district’, Daily Mail (25 July 2020), https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8558667/Dark-heart-Britains-legal-red-light-district.html

C. Brooke, ‘Rape and sex assaults soar in Britain's first official red light district causing police to double patrols and businesses to move away’, Daily Mail (16 December 2017), https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5185231/Rape-cases-soar-Britains-red-light-district.html

‘24 hours in Holbeck: A day in the strife of local residents’, Save Our Eyes (8 September 2018), http://saveoureyes.co.uk/24-hours-in-holbeck/

S. Finnegan, ‘Fetish murderer lied to parole board to get released from prison then attacked mum in Leeds’, Leeds Live (22 November 2019), https://www.leeds-live.co.uk/news/leeds-news/fetish-murderer-lied-parole-board-17302763

S. Gildea & K. Johnson, ‘Claims Holbeck 'under siege' after three separate attacks on women in 36 hours’, Leeds Live (4 June 2019), https://www.leeds-live.co.uk/news/leeds-news/claims-holbeck-under-siege-after-16376164

J. Bindel, ‘How Leeds enables ‘paid rape’, Unherd (20 July 2020), https://unherd.com/2020/07/how-authorities-in-leeds-enable-paid-rape/

C. Hymas & J. Bindel, ‘I gave up drugs to get out of the ‘managed’ red light zone – it was too dangerous’, The Telegraph (21 November 2018), https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/women-and-girls/gave-drugs-get-managed-red-light-zone-dangerous/

C. Hymas & C. Redfern, ‘Violence, drugs and sexual diseases: How managed zones for prostitution are failing women worldwide’, The Telegraph (23 July 2018), https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/women-and-girls/violence-drugs-sexual-diseases-managed-zones-prostitution-failing/

E. Carlisle, ‘Holbeck sex zone in the spotlight again’, South Leeds Life (31 August 2018), https://southleedslife.com/holbeck-sex-zone-in-the-spotlight-again/

C. Brooke, ‘Rape and sex assaults soar in Britain's first official red light district causing police to double patrols and businesses to move away’, Daily Mail (16 December 2017), https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5185231/Rape-cases-soar-Britains-red-light-district.html

J. Bindel, ‘How Leeds enables ‘paid rape’, Unherd (20 July 2020), https://unherd.com/2020/07/how-authorities-in-leeds-enable-paid-rape/

‘I was abducted from a Holbeck street and raped after being mistaken for a prostitute’, Save Our Eyes (25 July 2018), http://saveoureyes.co.uk/abducted-from-holbeck-street-raped-after-being-mistaken-for-prostitute/, Quoted in: E. Carlisle, ‘Holbeck sex zone in the spotlight again’, South Leeds Life (31 August 2018),

https://southleedslife.com/holbeck-sex-zone-in-the-spotlight-again/

‘24 hours in Holbeck: A day in the strife of local residents’, Save Our Eyes (8 September 2018), http://saveoureyes.co.uk/24-hours-in-holbeck/

M. Millington, ‘Man 'tried to buy a BABY for an hour' in Holbeck sex zone’, Leeds Live (13 November 2018), https://www.leeds-live.co.uk/news/leeds-news/man-tried-buy-baby-hour-15409375

S. Beever, ‘'I was raped in the street in Holbeck' - the women living around Leeds' Managed Approach zone speak out’, Yorkshire Evening Post (12 November 2019), https://www.yorkshireeveningpost.co.uk/news/crime/i-was-raped-street-holbeck-women-living-around-leeds-managed-approach-zone-speak-out-92021

S. Finnegan, ‘Fetish murderer lied to parole board to get released from prison then attacked mum in Leeds’, Leeds Live (22 November 2019), https://www.leeds-live.co.uk/news/leeds-news/fetish-murderer-lied-parole-board-17302763

S. Beever, ‘'I was raped in the street in Holbeck' - the women living around Leeds' Managed Approach zone speak out’, Yorkshire Evening Post (12 November 2019), https://www.yorkshireeveningpost.co.uk/news/crime/i-was-raped-street-holbeck-women-living-around-leeds-managed-approach-zone-speak-out-920212

‘How the managed approach to prostitution affects children in Leeds’, Save Our Eyes http://saveoureyes.co.uk/managed-approach-to-prostitution-affects-children-in-leeds/

‘A “dirty man” asked me for sex at the bus stop. I’m 13’, Save Our Eyes (22 October 2018), http://saveoureyes.co.uk/dirty-man-asked-me-for-sex-im-13/

‘Extra police for Holbeck's managed red light zone’, BBC News (13 December 2018), https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-leeds-46556805

.‘Extra police for Holbeck's managed red light zone’, BBC News (13 December 2018), https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-leeds-46556805

‘Independent Review into controversial Holbeck red-light zone in Leeds failed to consider equality implications & made claims NOT backed up by data’, Nordic Model Now (12 July 2020), https://nordicmodelnow.org/2020/07/12/press-release-campaign-group-finds-independent-review-into-controversial-holbeck-red-light-zone-in-leeds-failed-to-consider-equality-implications-made-claims-not-backed-up-by-data/

‘NMN response to the ‘Independent Review’ of the Holbeck red-light zone in Leeds’, Nordic Model Now (11 July 2020), https://nordicmodelnow.org/2020/07/11/nmn-response-to-the-independent-review-of-the-holbeck-red-light-zone-in-leeds/

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