THERE are as many as 20 prostitutes working on the town centre’s streets most nights, as vice police try to clamp down on the sex trade.

Many of the women have issues with drugs or alcohol and regularly risk their lives meeting strangers, who can turn violent, to feed their addiction.

The Adver went on patrol with Swindon vice manager PC Louise Kuklinski on Friday night for an insight into the seedy world, centreing around the County Road and Manchester Road area.

PC Kuklinski, who took over the dedicated role to tackle prostitution in the area late last year, has a wall of photos of around 30 women who are either actively working on the streets or have been identified as being at risk of falling into that trap.

Around 18 women are categorised as red risk, the highest category, while a handful are amber and green.

Known pimps, pushers and kerb crawlers are also monitored.

PC Kuklinski said: “We have around 30 on-street sex workers active at the moment and we regularly assess their risk levels.

“Our priority is safeguarding the girls and the red risk includes those who we know are out or have been sighted recently, while amber are ones we have concerns about and green are those who are not active but need monitoring.

“The majority have a problem with drugs or alcohol and some are controlled by people, which is part of the wider picture. That is quite difficult to target because the girls are too frightened to talk to us. We are not talking about the old-style pimps who control three or four girls, but they might be the boyfriend who is forcing them to go out and earn.

“It can be sporadic – on a regular eight or nine-hour patrol we might see six or seven girls out.

“We stop them and talk to them about why they are out and what they are doing and usually they cannot give a reasonable excuse.”

PC Kuklinski said the force’s focus was on the kerb-crawlers. She said the women had to be handled with care – treated as victims and witnesses instead of criminals.

“A lot of men think it is only an offence if they turn up in a vehicle but they can be guilty of an offence on foot,” she said, as we park up in a side street and see a suspicious man.

“The girls can be charged with loitering for the purposes of prostitution but they get a fine and that’s a vicious circle.

“They don’t have the means to pay the fine and so will have to work on the streets to earn it.

“Instead, we try to get them to engage with Swindon and Wiltshire Alcohol and Drugs Service and the CRI health and social care charity and break their alcohol or drug addiction.”

Equally, PC Kuklinski has to be constantly aware of younger girls who might end up on the streets.

While on patrol, she stops three 17-year-olds and warns them not to be out after 10pm.

It is part of the wider impact on the community that the police are conscious has blighted the tight-knit Broadgreen neighbourhood.

“The other side of prostitution is the community aspect, and many people who live here find it quite distressing,” PC Kuklinski said.

“They don’t want to see it in their neighbourhood but also I think they fear for the girls. Whenever we see young girls out on the streets late at night or in the evenings, we stop them and have a chat because they need to know the risks.”

 

Dicing with danger for lucractive work

Sarah has been working on the streets of Swindon since she was 16.

Now 25, she is still hooked on heroin and crack cocaine and sells her body on Manchester Road to fund her habit.
 

She admits it is lucrative work – she can earn up to £800 in one night with different clients – but she is all too aware of the risks.
 

“I was beaten badly by one guy last Sunday night,” the mother-of-one said.
 

“He punched me in the face several times. That is the first time I’ve properly been beaten. I don’t know why because he had already paid me, so it’s not like he was trying to get away with not paying.”
 

Sarah, who has not long been released from prison, has been in drug rehabilitation and recovery programmes, engaging with Inclusion, DHI and now CRI, but she said she might even work when she was clean.
 

“It’s the money and the drug habits,” she said.
 

“But even when I’m clean off drugs I will still work. It’s better than a nine-to-five job. You could never earn what I earn – I can get £800 a night on a weekend.
 

“It’s dangerous – you get groups of people coming up to you and trying to get it cheaper all the time, and then you can get attacked like I did.”
 

Sarah does not have a pimp, nor does she believe most of the other girls do, but those men who do act as such are usually pushy boyfriends.
 

She said: “I’ve never worked for anyone else – I work for myself. It’s not like what people say about pimps and you don’t get a pimp who has four or five working girls.
 

“Sometimes you get guys who go out with girls and the boyfriend is making them do it to make money.”
 

The police’s softer approach to on-street sex workers is the right way of handling the issue, Sarah says.

“It’s more about rehabilitating and getting them off the streets. It is safer to work in a massage parlour and there are a few in Swindon. There are a few everywhere and I’ve worked in Trowbridge and Chippenham too.

“I think they need to bring back the drop-in like Inclusion used to because that was something for us to go to during the day.”

  • Sarah’s name has been changed to protect her identity.