TORONTO -- An A-list prostitute working indoors faces the same dangers as drug-addicted hookers working the low track on the street, a court heard yesterday.
The case is a constitutional challenge, arguing that current laws preventing bawdy houses deny sex workers their right to liberty and security of life.
The dominatrix applicant, Terri-Jean Bedford, who was busted in 1999 for operating a bawdy house, is claiming her indoor dungeon is a safer place for her to work than on the street.
Everything about prostitution is dangerous, so the venue doesn't matter, said Michael Morris, Crown attorney for the federal government.
"There is no doubt terrible things happen on the street, but that doesn't prove indoors are safer. Terrible things happen indoors as well, so it doesn't support the applicants case," Morris said.
"The risks of prostituting come from prostitution and not from the criminal code related to it ... Johns can become violent (anywhere) at any moment," he said.
One Crown witness, a former prostitute who worked for an escort agency, agreed with Morris in an affidavit read in court.
"Working for an agency where you are driven to a house seems safer, but in the end I was alone and on my own. There were times the driver would hear me screaming and wouldn't come. Anytime you are alone with a John it is dangerous," the woman said.
Another prostitute who worked at a massage parlour said in her affidavit that she had been strangled and raped at her work.
"Screams in the house are common and no one gets involved," she said.
Morris says although the act of selling sex is legal, prostitutes have no right to have bawdy houses.
If bawdy houses were made legal, it would make it harder for cops to investigate, he argued.
"Trafficked women and under-aged prostitutes could be kept indoors making it harder for police to find them," Morris said.
"Allowing bawdy houses would benefit an elite group and make it harder to find if someone was being victimized," he said.
Bedford also wants communication laws preventing soliciting struck down because it forces sex workers into remote areas that are more dangerous.
Morris points out Toronto's main strolls are in the core of the city on relatively busy streets.
"Some conduct related to buying and selling sex is illegal ... the public display of the sale of sex is harmful ... the exposure to children and the community at large," Morris said. "Normalizing the sale of sex hurts society."
KEVIN.CONNOR@SUNMEDIA.CA
