Escorts still for sale
Just over one year ago, this newspaper broke a story that a brothel was operating out of a house across the street from the Rowe Street Church in Wexford town.
Twelve months on and the website which we used to get in contact with the ‘escorts’ is still operating and on Thursday evening had ten women listed as escorts operating in County Wexford. Two of the women advertised their addresses as Gorey, one in New Ross and the rest were located in Wexford.
At the time of the exposé last year, there was outrage that a brothel could operate in such a central and obvious location in Wexford town. However once the furore died down, the website continued to advertise the ‘services’ of these women without any attempt being put in place to curtail the blatant advertisement of sex for money on the internet.
There is no need for a credit card or special password to get onto this site and once you click a button declaring you are over-18 and agree with the terms and conditions of the site, you are given contact numbers for hundred of women across the country.
The two women operating in Gorey advertised their time as being on sale for up to €120-an-hour and while a disclaimer said that anything which happened between the parties was a coincidence, it is clear for all to see that this site is providing names and contact numbers for prostitutes.
The question over whether prostitution is legal or not is not the issue. The issue I have is that a website which openly flaunts women for sale in every county of the country has not been shut down or even curtailed in its operation.
Gardaí are aware of the website yet seem to be powerless to do anything about it. The website is set up outside the country and therefore skirts our laws while raking in money from women, some of whom have turned to prostitution against their will.
The site is run by an Englishwoman who makes no apologises for her business stressing that she is doing nothing illegal. She charges each escort a fee for advertising their goods (for want of a better word) on her site and after that it is all up to the individual girl and her customer.
We are expected to believe that should sexual intercourse occur between the two this is just a coincidence and the customers are paying over €100 an hour for the woman’s company.
This is in spite of each woman having naked and semi-naked pictures of themselves on their profile page.
The website is nothing if not thorough and men (and possibly women) looking to spend some quality time with the women can read in-depth reviews of the girls from previous clients who leave little to the imagination when describing their time with the escorts.
The website is even so helpful as to offer a full reference page explaining all the terms used throughout the site, some of which even the most well-travelled of us would find impossible to explain.
Last year I made contact with a woman using her mobile phone number at the top of her profile page and within minutes I was at the door of the house in Wexford. It is that easy.
The women seem to travel in groups around the country setting up in privately rented houses for a week or two at a time before moving on to another area.
While all escorts on the site claim to be independent escorts, in the murky world of prostitution it is hard to tell who is controlling who and what pressure these women are under to continue in this oldest of professions.