Prostitutes come out for mas

Sunday Newsday Investigation

Despite several raids and police patrols to clamp down on prostitution in the Woodbrook, Port-of-Spain area, residents are still unhappy about what continues to plague the neighbourhood. Frequent police patrols have contained the problem to a certain extent, but residents said there are still prostitutes out at night, even though their numbers have been reduced. The Carnival season, however, is a major attraction and residents fear the situation will cause problems. One resident said he was fed up of  the problem but agreed that the police were doing a fairly good job. He said, however, they need to patrol the area more frequently, if the problem of prostitution is to be totally eradicated. A spokesperson for the area said: “Police have been making raids regularly but they still come out around only at month end.”

A resident on Rosalino Street, told Sunday Newsday that his life has drastically changed by the action of the police. He said before the police patrols, the prostitues used to come out regularly in groups, about a dozen, with about three pimps with activities not being too far away. The increase in police patrols have decreased those numbers significantly, but they still take their chances, hustling whatever money they can make within a shorter period of time. Carnival is likely to increase the number, as has happened in the past. One resident, whose street has its own regulars, said very young girls, sometimes as young as 14 and 15 years old are part of the sex trade. In a conversation with one of them, the resident said the girl told him she can make as much as $1,000 a night. This is not surprising to him as he looks at the high-priced cars that cruise the area picking up the girls. “You should see the type of cars like Audis and Peugeots, so I would imagine the type of people in our society who supports the trade,” he said. Describing the problem as “Sodom and Gomorrah”, he  said he has also seen married couples solicit sexual acts from the prostitutes. When they come out in large numbers, the residents said they make a lot of noise, use loud expletives and leave the surroundings in a dirty state. “Some mornings, I find boxes of chicken and chips on my pavement. One night, they broke my window and another time, I found used condoms in my plants,” he said. In addition, residents reported that they throw bottles all over the place, engage in fights and urinate against their walls. “It’s not as bad as before but with two murders in the area within recent times, it is still a matter of concern for us,”said one resident.

A male resident said he was tackled by a prostitute one night who told him: “Baby, you stay right here. We are going for a car and we will take you to have a good time.” The flabbergasted resident said: “Imagine, I was not there to have a good time to look for a prostitute, but they are tackling innocent and harmless residents like me.” While some feel the problem still persists, there are others who are breathing a sigh of relief because of the police patrols. Legends masband leader, “Big” Mike Antoine, whose mascamp is located at the corner of Carlos and Roberts Street, said: “They no longer hang around the mascamp anymore since the police have been patrolling the area, so we are very happy about that.” Inspector Joanne James of the Woodbrook police station boasted that the problem has decreased considerably since they’ve stepped up their patrols in the area. She said for the past year alone they’ve had 178 patrols by day and 85 by night. She pointed out that last Carnival, there was only one arrest and recently they have been involved in a number of raids. “We have saturated our patrols in the area this year, so we expect that the problem will be considerably reduced and our primary function is to eradicate it altogether,” said Inspector James. Noting that Woodbrook has been a place, historically popular for prostitution, she appealed to the community to continue the co-operation they have had with the police, since this is what is needed to eradicate the problem totally.

Prostitution:

A flourishing business in TT, says official

Prostitution has become a flourishing business in TT, especially around Carnival time says president and founder of the group, Friends for Life, Eswick Padmore. This was information based on studies done on marginalised communities in conjunction with the United Nations recently. He said, however, it is not just women in the business but men and even street children, are quickly becoming part of the sex trade. Friends for Life is a non-governmental organisation which deals specifically with counselling of people infected or affected with the HIV/AIDS virus for men who have sex with men (msn) and commercial sex workers (csw).

As a counsellor at the organisation, Padmore said one of his greatest concerns is that the men are not using condoms, thereby, putting themselves at a very high risk in contracting the HIV/AIDS virus and other sexually transmitted diseases. The challenge with this, though, is the temptation for more money, in that some people provide extra cash (for example, $100 extra) to the prostitutes not to use condoms. He said the business of prostitution is flourishing right under our noses in places such as the Promenade, in downtown, Port-of-Spain, which is frequently used as a meeting spot. Padmore said based on research, they also found that children are hanging out downtown and in places where electronic and computer games are played but the games is the cover-up. They are all there to sell their bodies. “Around this Carnival period they will come out even more now because of the foreigners and their dollars. For some of them, this is their time because they have a sure clientele,” he said.

While he is not judgemental about commercial sex workers, he is concerned about the trade being a breeding ground for HIV/AIDS. “We already have limited resources in our health care and this will eventually have an impact on our labour force. So, these foreigners are coming here and acting out their sexual fantasies, but they are putting our human resources at risk when they refuse to have sexual intercourse without the condoms,” he said.

He appealed to commercial sex workers and sexually active people to make sure they protect themselves at all times since they will not know who has the virus. Padmore said many times, young women offer their bodies and don’t care about protection because they are willing to do anything for the US dollars. “But they feel the effects of it several weeks or months later when they begin to see symptoms of HIV, another STD or pregnancy,” he said. Padmore felt that poverty and unemployment were major  underlying factors that lead people into prostitution, saying: “It’s all about the hustle, the need to survive.”

Call girl:

It’s all about survival

There are basically no excuses why some people, both male and female should choose prostitution as a job said one call girl, but in the end, “it’s all about the money and survival,” she said. Nicole (not her real name), said she did not know why people had to be so judgemental about people who become commercial sex workers, because one might find themselves in the same situation one day. She said for the most part, women who had been left stranded by their male partners and have no one to turn to for help and have an entire family to feed, are the ones who end up on the streets.

Nicole said she is well-educated and had a very good, steady job, but that was over nine years ago. She said she took her husband to court and since then, has been doing fairly okay for herself. But what about other women in society who are not as fortunate? “Bad situations, men abandoning their wives and children without support, women in abusive relationships who have no one to turn to, poverty and unemployment are some of the reasons why women turn to prostitution,” she said.

The call girl said she has had a few men as well calling in, willing to do the job, simply because there is no other way to feed their families. In the escort or call service, the women are paid simply to do just that — escort the client. However, because of the need for extra money, they sometimes go the extra mile to provide sexual favours. “But that is when they put themselves at risk to HIV/AIDS and other STDs,” she said. The standard price for a call-girl is $100 to $150 a night and the price could increase accordingly. One young prostitute said on a good night, she can make as much as $500-$1,000. Of course, the US dollars are the most favourable. Some could charge foreigners high as US$100 to US$300, depending on what sexual acts they are willing to offer. Nicole felt the call services are much safer than turning to prostitution on the streets, which she decribed as dangerous. In an attempt to speak to a call girl, Sunday Newsday was barred from talking to a girl who had initially agreed to speak with us. On the day of the scheduled interview, a man refused her the permission to speak to me. One of the dangers of prostitution on the streets and more organised call services, is the system of being managed by a “pimp”, who run the women’s lives. “Not all the women who engage in prostitution are as fortunate as I am. Some of them come from real poverty and have no other choice but to survive by being on the streets. Some of them don’t care how far they have to go and what type of sexual acts they must perform, once they get the money,” she said.

Speaking from her experience in dealing with people in the business, she said, a woman who has been dependent on her husband, might wake up one morning and find that there is no food to feed her five or six children. She might try to look for a job and may not be very successful and this is the decision she may end up having to make. “There are some things that happen to people that just make them go right down the ladder and they will have to do certain things in order to survive. All those rich people who feel they will always be rich — unfortunate things can happen to anyone, even to the best of us and that is reality,” she said. Nicole lamented however, business is not as good as it used to be. While some have said Carnival is the most lucrative time for prostitution, she said business was poor last year. Competition, she suspected may have come from the many other escort and call services which have sprung up over the years. She said even the money which the client offers isn’t as lucrative. “But some women still have to do it because we still have to survive.

There is hunger and being so absolutely hungry that you will do anything to survive,” she said. And who supports the trade? “You will be very surprised, I cannot call names because I promise utmost confidentiality to our clientel, but let’s just say these people have very reputable jobs,” she said. The call girl called on government to open up more jobs and training skills programmes for women. “If government is really serious about eradicating poverty and social ills, it would do all it could to alleviate prostitute and street children,” she said. Nicole suggested opening up more avenues for social welfare services, especially to abandoned women who have families to feed and more adult literacy classes so they can improve themselves for better job opportunities.

Minister: You don’t have to sell your bodies for money

Social Development Minister, Mustapha Abdul-Hamid, said no matter how terrible things become for a woman, she should not have to go that route and sell her body for money. He said there is always the monthly public social welfare assistance for single-parent mothers which is given according to how many children the woman has and several programmes for women under the Ministry of Social Development and Gender Affairs. Mental Health Psychologist at the St Ann’s Psychiatric Hospital, Dr Krishna Maharaj, said that men and women who end up in prostitution need to be assisted in achieving self-worth, self-morality and values. He said beside having training skills programmes and job opportunities for those who have fallen into this category, there is also the need for counselling and rehabilitation. Dr Maharaj pointed out that beside the socio-economic factors, prostitutes are people who come from a “learned environment,” in that they are perpetuating what they may have learned while growing up.

Another key factor, he said, is that in many cases, commercial sex workers were found to have been sexually abused, molested or raped as a child at some point in their life. As a result, they may be acting out excess amount of libido that may have been stimulated from childhood. He felt that for those who do end up in this situation, it is very difficult for them to come out of it since the commercial sex worker, knowing the power of their service and the demand, enjoys exercising that power to control the price and the service offered or refuse accordingly. Dr Maharaj said this is where rehabilitation services and the need for it come in for those who have the desire to get out of it.