Later on last year in 2019, a good friend of mine contacted me on a Friday night. She told me she’d had a visit from two male police officers at 5pm, issuing her with a summons to court.
This was for the breach of a section 222 order, for soliciting on two occasions. She told me she had just recently had confirmation of a pregnancy and had begun to change her lifestyle.
For the love of God! the news of a baby was so fantastic as she’s tried for years to start a family, and had thought for a long time that she was infertile.
With all of this in mind, and having survived living with multiple disadvantages and being an ex street based sex worker myself, I knew it was my absolute duty to help support this friend through this bad
experience.
Because of my own experience, I knew that persecuting street based sex workers is wrong, degrading, demoralising and against a basic human right.
After a consultation with my good friend, I told her I could and would fully support her through the difficult day in court.
Over that weekend, I’d given careful consideration to how I was going to support her. I decided to write a letter to the judge who would be in court that following Monday morning. Because my friend
was handed this summons on a Friday tea time, this left not one minute to seek legal advice as her court appearance was the following Monday.
So I wrote my letter, and handed it to the prosecuting solicitor on that Monday morning.
To my ecstatic surprise, he’d gone away to address his legal team, then fifteen minutes later he returned to where we were sitting and said to my friend that it was no longer in their interest to persecute her and that she could leave the court without fear of her family finding out, or any further repercussions from her original summons.
Thank God for small mercies, strong minded women, and people who believe there’s always a light at the end of the tunnel, and a way out of the misery associated with multiple disadvantages, drug and alcohol addiction and prostitution.
I’m writing this a whole year after my legal experience. My friend has since given birth to a beautiful baby boy and is settled in her new home with plenty of support from family and friends.
So, with the right people to support you, help you, guide you, I promise that you can always start a fresh, new, meaningful life.
Yours Truly
Susie