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Author Topic: Legal Question  (Read 13546 times)

sara76

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Legal Question
« on: 09 March 2007, 02:10:23 pm »
Hi there,

My first visit to this forum and I would like to ask for some legal advice and I hope some of you might be able to help.

I have escorted before. To start with as an independent and later at a parlour. There was pluses and minuses to both which I'm sure most of you know so I won't go into them now.

Now I have taken a bit of a break from sex work but I would like to get back into it. Ideally I want to be independent again as a parlour was too much like a conveyor belt of guys for me.

My dilemma is that I want to do incalls but not from my own home. I know a guy who used to be security at the last parlour I worked at who is offering me the chance to do this from his place but obviously at a price but I am happy with that price.

I sort of like this set up as it would allow me to do incalls somewhere other than my own home and the guy would be in the house (but elsewhere) in case anything happened and I kinda like that security aspect as well.

The thing I need to know is the legal aspect, not just for myself but also for the guy as I don't want to get him into trouble either.

Also if I'm honest I may not do escorting from there as I've been toying with the idea for quite a while of becoming a Mistress/Dominatrix as I really enjoyed that work when I was at the parlour.

So can anybody give me some advice on this? Both for escorting and being a Dominatrix?

Any help would be really appreciated.

Love and hugs

Sara xxxx


Louise

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Re: Legal Question
« Reply #1 on: 09 March 2007, 02:59:59 pm »
I'm not too sure
but maybe he could be done for being a pimp as he is getting money from you via immoral earnings(and profiterring from prostitution)
please dont take what i have said as gospel as im a deffo no legal eagle

sara76

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Re: Legal Question
« Reply #2 on: 09 March 2007, 04:59:54 pm »
Thanks Louise for the reply and that's what I was thinking really that he could done for the immoral earnings thing.

I was sort of thinking that working as a Dominatrix might be different but more wishful thinking than anything I guess.

Oh well it was a nice idea so back to the drawing board.

Thanks again for taking the time to reply.

Sara xxxx

brandy@saafe

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Re: Legal Question
« Reply #3 on: 09 March 2007, 08:00:39 pm »
Hi Sara,
Welcome to the forum, happy you've found us. Although I'm also no legal eagle, I do agree with Lou in that whilst what you're doing is legal (working on your own from private premises), your friend could be done for living off immoral earnings.
And from what I've read and learnt in the past, working as a Dominatrix is a very grey area indeed. It's not actually legal, whilst being an escort is. I do both, and there is a site where I used to get all my information from to keep me up-to-date and I can't for the life of me remember what it's called. I've just had a quick google and I can't find it now, I'll have a better look tomorrow.
Where's SW5 when you need them?

brandy@saafe

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Re: Legal Question
« Reply #4 on: 10 March 2007, 11:15:43 am »
I contacted a lifestyle Domina friend of mine and she reminded me of the site I was thinking about last night. It's called The Spanner Trust. It has a couple of links to the legal side of Domination http://www.spannertrust.org/indexpage.asp?cat=6 Hope it helps.

xw5

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Re: Legal Question
« Reply #5 on: 12 March 2007, 11:34:28 am »
You're fine, as far as the escorting goes, incall or outcall.

He (or anyone else) can legally gain from your work (i.e. be paid rent or act as security) provided that they do not control your work.

(This was one of the changes in the Sexual Offences Act 2003 which got rid of the old laws often misleading referred to as the laws against 'immoral earnings'. Now, you can control someone else's prostitution, or you can gain from it, but you can't do both.)

I can see that being both the landlord and the 'person on the premises' could make it look more likely that he does control your work, so you need to be very very clear about who's in charge (you). You pay him, he provides what you paid for and the less contact he has with clients, the better, really.

If he does not own the property, but is renting it himself, he'll be breaking section 36 of the Sexual Offences Act 1956 which makes it an offence for a tenant to knowingly permit their premises to be used for "habitual prostitution", even by a single person, even though that person is not doing anything illegal. In practice, he'd have to be staggeringly unlucky to be caught by this.

As far as dominatrix work is concerned, R v Brown (i.e. the Spanner case) says consent is worse than irrelevant for injuries inflicted for sexual pleasure, if they are more than 'transient and trifling'. Hence anyone inflicting them is guilty of assault.

Lots of pro dommes make a point about saying they don't have 'sex' with clients. That's mostly trying to pretend they're not prostitutes, because these are services of a sexual nature. Selling them is legal, up to the point that you cross the Spanner line.

The basic way to avoid trouble is to make damn sure you don't cross that line. You don't want to leave marks, basically. Humiliation, bondage, pain play, watersports - fine. Hitting them with something that leaves marks for more than an annoyingly unspecified time - risky.

The good news is that lots of clients don't want to leave with marks either, due to not wanting to have to explain them away to someone.

(Isn't anyone allowed a weekend off, especially when this site was off the internet for a while during that time? :) )
'The Ian formerly known as SW5'. What they said: "Indispensable", "You are our best resource", and (hours later!) "I'm afraid that you're being made redundant..."

Winding down YourEscortSite.com

sara76

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Re: Legal Question
« Reply #6 on: 12 March 2007, 01:53:35 pm »
Thankyou SW5 very much for your reply.

I'm not sure whther the guy owns the house or not. I think he rents but I'll have to ask about that.

As for controlling me then he definitely wouldn't be doing that. I will decide what days I'll be working, what hours, my fees etc and even though him being in the house would give me some security, then this wouldn't always be the case as he's made it clear that on Mon, Tues and Thurs he will be out all day and it was my intention to work on maybe 2 of those days.

As for the Domintrix side then I was aware of much of what you said as I have worked as a Domintrix before in a parlour. I realise that all acts must be legal. Marks have to disappear in 10 mins, etc etc.

However I still am a little confused as to the legality as I don't want to get anyone, myself or somebody else, in trouble.

So how am I legally if I work solely as a Domintrix (no sexual services of any kind) where I stay within the law with what I do and I rent the room from the guy and he may or may not be there?

Would that be ok?

I sort of prefer the idea of working as a Domme anyway as not only did I like that work before, some escort work did get inside my head a bit hence why I had to take a break for a while.

Take Care

Sara xxxx




brandy@saafe

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Re: Legal Question
« Reply #7 on: 12 March 2007, 02:19:39 pm »

(Isn't anyone allowed a weekend off, especially when this site was off the internet for a while during that time? :) )

No you can't, and blame GoDaddy. :P

xw5

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Re: Legal Question
« Reply #8 on: 12 March 2007, 03:35:11 pm »
Quote from: sara76
I'm not sure whther the guy owns the house or not. I think he rents but I'll have to ask about that.

As I said, he'd have to be staggeringly unlucky for anyone to care about this aspect.

Quote
I will decide what days I'll be working, what hours, my fees etc and even though him being in the house would give me some security, then this wouldn't always be the case

Yep, all that sounds good evidence that he's not controlling your work.

Quote
Marks have to disappear in 10 mins, etc etc.

One of the annoying things is that there isn't actually an exact definition of 'transient', but ten minutes is going to be ok.

Quote
So how am I legally if I work solely as a Domintrix .. where I stay within the law with what I do and I rent the room from the guy and he may or may not be there?[

Would that be ok?

Yes - and it doesn't matter whether you domme them or shag them (or indeed both).

Even if he rents the place out to someone else as well (in which case it's a brothel: illegal to own, manage or allow in a property you control), you'd be ok.
'The Ian formerly known as SW5'. What they said: "Indispensable", "You are our best resource", and (hours later!) "I'm afraid that you're being made redundant..."

Winding down YourEscortSite.com

xw5

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Re: Legal Question
« Reply #9 on: 12 March 2007, 03:39:26 pm »
Quote from: brandy@saafe
blame GoDaddy.

Yeah, I saw someone else complain about what happened to their site, looked up who does the DNS for here and went "Ah ha, another one for the queue of angry customers!"

They've only had two years to prepare for the change in start date for summer time there...
'The Ian formerly known as SW5'. What they said: "Indispensable", "You are our best resource", and (hours later!) "I'm afraid that you're being made redundant..."

Winding down YourEscortSite.com

sara76

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Re: Legal Question
« Reply #10 on: 12 March 2007, 08:30:26 pm »
Thankyou once again SW5 for your very informative reply and I can't thank you enough for your help.

Could I ask you one more question?

As I said my idea is to work as a Dominatrix and rent this room. Now you have made it clear that I am ok legally but the guy could be done under section 36 of the sexual offences act 1956 for "habitual prostitution" although you also said "he would have to be staggeringly unlucky" with this.

How does that change if I only work as a Dominatrix? As I wouldn't be working as a prostitute does the "habitual prostitution" thing come into it?

I'm not just asking here because I don't want to get anybody else in trouble. What I don't want is for the guy to get charged and go to court and then for my name to be mentioned in court as the person who rented the room.

I promise that this is my last question.

Take Care

Sara xxxx


xw5

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Re: Legal Question
« Reply #11 on: 13 March 2007, 01:14:29 pm »
Quote from: sara76
How does that change if I only work as a Dominatrix? As I wouldn't be working as a prostitute does the "habitual prostitution" thing come into it?

One of the other things the Sexual Offences Act 2003 did was introduce a definition of "prostitution": offering or providing sexual services to another person in return for any financial arrangement.

Another section defined "sexual". Penetration, touching or any other activity is sexual if a reasonable person would consider that (a) it is because of its nature sexual, or (b) because of its nature it may be sexual and because of its circumstances or the purpose of any person in relation to it (or both) it is sexual.

The conclusion? Dominatrix work is providing sexual services for money = legally, it's 'prostitution' just as much as shagging them for money is.

(Disclaimer: as far as I can see, no case involving pro dom(me) work has ended up in court, so it's possible that some court somewhere will disagree with this, but I really can't see anyone saying that clients don't go for sexual purposes. Lawyers and judges know what they're paying for. Look at the places, like your former workplace, where domination etc is in the middle of a menu of sexual services.)

Quote
I'm not just asking here because I don't want to get anybody else in trouble. What I don't want is for the guy to get charged and go to court and then for my name to be mentioned in court as the person who rented the room.

I can't find the figures at the moment (they're somewhere with no electricty, heating, water etc, so I'm sitting somewhere else) but my memory is telling me that there's only been one case for this in the past fifteen years and there weren't many more before that. Hence the 'staggeringly unlucky' comment.

Even if he were, it's unlikely you'd be named. Does he even know your real name?

As ever the basic advice of not annoying the neighbours applies. They can't complain to anyone about something they don't know about.
'The Ian formerly known as SW5'. What they said: "Indispensable", "You are our best resource", and (hours later!) "I'm afraid that you're being made redundant..."

Winding down YourEscortSite.com

sara76

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Re: Legal Question
« Reply #12 on: 14 March 2007, 12:03:30 pm »
OK thanks again for providing the information and for clarifying things for me legally. All I wanted to do was go into something with my eyes completely open and not take somebody elses word for it and find out for myself as there are plenty of old wives tales in this business that many believe to be the law and I wanted to make sure.

So thanks again for taking the time to help me out as I do really appreciate it.

To answer a couple of your questions then yes he does know my real name. When I worked at the parlour and he worked as security then he went out with one of the other girls there who I was good friends with and who I used to go out for a drink with socially. He got to know my real name that way.

Lastly I take your point about not annoying the neighbours and this is something Michael has pointed out to me in that while I am free to choose my hours, fees, times I work etc etc then he wants to limit the amount of guys per day so as not to have too many coming in and out.

He also wants me not to give the address out when I make the booking and ask the guy to ring from a location I give him close by about 5 mins before and I then direct him to the place.

That way he says if the guy doesn't turn up then at least he doesn't know the address of the place.

As I said I really appreciate you going to the trouble of replying to me and helping me and I can't thank you enough.

Take care

Sara xxxx

xw5

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Re: Legal Question
« Reply #13 on: 14 March 2007, 03:22:05 pm »
Quote from: sara76
there are plenty of old wives tales in this business that many believe to be the law

If I hear the phrase 'immoral earnings' one more time... :)

The various things you've mentioned (like not giving out the address) sound good.

Quote
he wants to limit the amount of guys per day so as not to have too many coming in and out.

That may well be sensible, but you need to consider this when talking about the rent: there's not only the cost per day/week/month but also the cost per client to think about.

Is it possible to be charged 'by the booking', for example?

If not, you can work out how many clients it will take to pay for the space - remembering that effectively they're freebies: the money ends up in someone else's pocket.

Equally it may affect how long your minimum appointment is. If you can't have many a day, you may want longer bookings, e.g. by emphasising the lengthy bondage sessions you offer...
'The Ian formerly known as SW5'. What they said: "Indispensable", "You are our best resource", and (hours later!) "I'm afraid that you're being made redundant..."

Winding down YourEscortSite.com

sara76

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Re: Legal Question
« Reply #14 on: 14 March 2007, 04:45:50 pm »
We never discussed about being charged by the booking. I never sort of thought of that. We did just discuss a flat daily rate.

If I did ask about being charged per booking then would you have any idea of what a reasonable amount would be per booking?

Round here for domme stuff most other dommes are around the ?100-?125 per hour figure although I have seen another dommes website where she charges ?150 but that seems a bit excessive.

Likewise if I did go down the escorting road then most are ?100-?150 per hour depending on the service required.

Any basic idea would help so I don't get taken for a ride.

We were looking at 3-4 appointments a day max which is something we both agreed on.

I don't want more than that as I might as well go back to a parlour and have the conveyor belt start up all over again. As for the length of time then I am not going to do half hours. I will however offer 1 1/2 hours and not just the bog standard 1 hour, 2 hours, 3 hours etc etc as sometimes an hour is not long enough and 2 hours can be too long for domme stuff for some of them to handle.

As always thanks for the taking the time to reply to me.

Take care

Sara76 xxxx