What To Do Now
April 30th,Miss Victoria X, who I have not yet had the pleasure of meeting, posted a pretty comprehensive rundown of relevant case law. There’s also some vigorous case law research happening in the comments to my last post.
Playing armchair lawyer is all well and good, but in my understanding, it’s a moot point. The girls were charged with a specific offense (sexual intercourse for money) that no one at that house ever performed or offered. You read that right: It’s not about domination. So we can drop the debates about whether a technicality got them in trouble. This is about being female and politically unpalatable.
As angry as I am, it’s useless — I’m just a bystander here. All I’ve lost is a job.
Since I posted, I’ve been getting privately a lot of offers of support. That’s sweet and it warms my heart. I’ve also noticed a surprising dearth of aspersions, at least within the community: surprising, considering how much we’d all rather believe that the girls screwed up than that the police would arrest innocent women on patently false pretenses. No one wants to believe that she can be arrested for being female in the wrong place at the wrong time.
I will try to pass on your support, but please understand that except for a few phone numbers and email addresses, we’re not a community and there isn’t any plan of action.
If you need to do something RIGHT NOW, please consider donating to the Sex Worker Project and the National Coalition for Sexual Freedom. And again, keep the rumors down.
If you are a sex worker thinking of taking the jump to independent, this looks like a good time! I’ve been recommended Arena Studios and Pandora’s Box for session rentals, and will review them if I try them.
April 30th, at 11:16 am
Good luck!
April 30th, at 12:18 pm
Here’s the direct url for the sex workers project:
http://www.sexworkersproject.org/
April 30th, at 3:14 pm
I agree with Rebecca about the ridiculous figure ($220? insult to injury!) Do you know if the SWP is getting involved in terms of legal services? I would love to see the girls fight this thing. I have absolutely no idea what’s going on with them now, haven’t heard about this other than from you (& the Post). I’d love to hear from everyone involved once the dust settles.
I’ll wait to hear from people about this, & until then, I hope they land on their feet.
Independent does seem safer right now - certainly more discreet. I’m sure you’ll do well.
I wonder if the “annoyed neighbor” they quoted had anything to do with the bust… On second thought, I am not going to base my analysis on tabloid reporting
April 30th, at 4:41 pm
In all the talk of legal matters, the main point is lost. Pro-domination is close enough to prostitution that the police will always be able to conduct a raid and make arrests whenever they want to. Even if the cops know that the charges are false and won’t stick, the house is destroyed. Staff will leave, the landlord gets unwanted publicity, and clients are scared off. The women arrested are caught in a nightmare of 24 hours in jail, needing money for legal bills, and getting their names in the newspapers.
The legal definitions and the case law only come into play if the women choose to fight the charges - and that takes time and money. Their jobs and good reputations are already gone. Why not take a quick plea to a lesser charge? The damage has been done to them, and they gain nothing by fighting.
The police have tremendous power here. Sad, but true. I think the raid on HC shows that the police can shut down any dungeon they want to. I think people in the scene say that they have the law on their side out of fear. It could happen to any house or domme.
The accident at Nutcracker made some official action inevitable. A tourist was almost killed at an unlicensed, unregulated establishment where people did dangerous things. This makes the city look very bad. The article on HC in Timeout NY made HC the most visible dungeon in NYC. So, the city used its power, the power to send the police in to make arrests, to show that it will take action to preserve public safety.
The details of the law on prostitution have nothing to do with all this. If you think it does, you do not know how government reacts to bad press and how broad its power to arrest is. And arrests are all that are needed to close a dungeon.
April 30th, at 5:01 pm
I’m pretty sure that you could be arrested for being in the wrong place at the wrong time even if you’re male, too. If clients were currently in session, wouldn’t they have been arrested as johns, and isn’t buying PIV-sex just as illegal as selling it?
I don’t mean to imply that I think the situation would be different if the girls were men, but I do want to imply that this is not about anatomy, this is about sexuality, and that distinction should not be lost just because this was the workplace of (female) pro-dommes.
But then again, I’ve got a penis so what do I know?
April 30th, at 7:18 pm
Lots, babe, you know lots.
Interestingly, one of the women was in session at the time of the raid (I cleaned up the abandoned room the next morning, and saw it in the book) which means there was at least one male client. No men were arrested.
It is perhaps disingenuous of me to suggest that being female was a contributing factor to the arrests. But being of the primary service-provider gender surely did. I’m pretty sure a male (not usually service-provider-gendered) receptionist wouldn’t have been arrested for prostitution.
How do you decide what factor contributed to discriminatory treatment? Cause or correlation? I don’t know.
May 1st, at 1:46 am
Yeah, men almost never get arrested. Grr. And I hate the humiliation factor of printing their names. ::shakes head::
I’ve heard good stuff about Pandora’s Box, and I worry a lot less as an independent.
May 1st, at 3:53 am
I’ll be curious to see how you like being an independent. You had mentioned that the HC’s “friendly dungeon” atmosphere had cramped you style as you wanted to do more (if I remember correctly) heavy bondage and coporal. As an independent you can appeal to those who share your tastes. The down side being you have to do more of the arranging/booking.
You might also look at The Parthenon, I sessioned there several times and really liked the place; 4 or 5 large, well equipped, well maintained rooms.
Best of luck whatever you decide.