S.H.O.P. & Happy City St. John’s to host city-wide meetings with innovative Vancouver-based organization on community safety and collaboration

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

June 13, 2017

St. John’s, NL

 

S.H.O.P. & Happy City St. John’s to host city-wide meetings with innovative Vancouver-based organization on community safety and collaboration

 

Safe Harbour Outreach Project (S.H.O.P.) and Happy City St John’s are hosting the Living in Community initiative that works to find solutions to the impact of sex work and youth sexual exploitation on communities and to reduce the harms and isolation that sex workers experience. Culminating in a year-long pilot project led by S.H.O.P., several sessions with community groups, government, law enforcement, sex workers and residents will work towards applying the successful Vancouver model for safer communities to St. John’s.

S.H.O.P. and Happy City are also hosting a public information session this evening, which will be an opportunity to hear in detail about Living in Community’s innovative policy work in Vancouver, British Columbia in the aftermath of the tragedy of missing and murdered sex workers in Vancouver’s Downtown East side. Living in Community will outline its experience addressing sex work-related policy and best practices working with residents, neighbourhood groups, business associations, law enforcement, government, health, non-profit organizations, and sex workers to make communities safer for all.

This session will conclude with a Q & A with S.H.O.P. and Living in Community on the ways to adapt lessons and best practices to the St. John’s context, to effectively respond to communities in St. John’s where sex work happens. The session will be at the Crypt (basement) of the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist, at 16 Church Hill. The information session is free and physically accessible.

 

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Media contact:

Heather Jarvis, Program Coordinator, Safe Harbour Outreach Project

heather@sjwomenscentre.ca

709.771.1077

Lisa Gibson, Director of Living In Community

lisa@livingincommunity.ca

 

BACKGROUNDER

Living in Community

Living in Community (LIC) is an innovative community initiative that works to find solutions to the impact of sex work and youth sexual exploitation on communities and to reduce the harms and isolation that sex workers experience. LIC recognizes that systemic change only happens when groups work collaboratively – little is achieved when people work in opposition to one another. That’s why our work is directed by a diverse group of representatives such as: residents, neighbourhood houses, business associations, law enforcement, government, health, non-profit organizations and sex workers. Watch LIC’s short video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_9YYJt4Saw

Safe Harbour Outreach Project

As a project of the St. John’s Status of Women Council/Women’s Centre, Safe Harbour Outreach Project (S.H.O.P.) was established in 2013 and is the first and only front-line service supporting women who do sex work in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador and exists to advocate for the human rights of sex workers.

Happy City St. John’s

Happy City is a non-profit organization that aims to help people develop a clear picture of what municipal issues are and to understand what can be done about the challenges we face as a city.

RED ALERT – SHOP issues a Red Alert in the St. John’s area

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A “Red Alert” is a tool SHOP uses to spread awareness and information about violent clients. The information is meant for those engaged in sex trade activities; we share information through Red Alerts so that people working in that industry can make informed decisions about the clients they see.

SHOP has received multiple reports from numerous women who do sex work; we believe they are all referring to the same violent client. Given the number, and escalating nature of violence in the reports, SHOP is issuing a “Red Alert” to warn people working in sex industry about this potentially violent client.

Initially, reports came from women who were working on Long’s Hill. The client was picking them up at that location and driving to other locations in the city where the assaults then happened in his truck. More recently, reports are coming in that a man matching the same description was physically violent with women doing indoor work. With regards to the indoor work, it was reported that the client will only meet at the worker’s location – he prefers in-call only.

The reports include both sexual and physical violence; this client has forced women to engage in sexual services without payment or consent, and he has also engaged in physical violence ranging from locking women in his vehicle, to kicking, punching, stepping on women, and in one case grabbing a woman by the hair and smashing her head off the windows and dashboard of the truck.

Vehicle: Red GMC pickup truck, possibly a ford.

Perpetrator description: Skinny to average size, with a “beer gut”, approx 140-150 lbs; medium height, approx 5’7″ to 5’8″. Depending on lighting his hair has been described as a strawberry blond/ grayish blond. He has very light greenish blue eyes, and one notable feature was that he had very blond, almost white eyelashes and eyebrows. His voice was “nasally” sounding. Numerous women said they would describe him as “strange looking” because of the eye lashes and brows, and said that he “looked very small driving the big truck”. He has a few tattoos on his arms – these are individual tattoos, spread apart, not a sleeve. He also has a little facial hair, and at one time was reported to be wearing multiple hoop earrings. He uses a three-letter name.

Location: Long’s Hill and also in-call locations.

Please call Laura or Heather at SHOP, at 771-7171 or 771-1077 for further info. Any further reports can be made anonymously to the WOW (Warn Other Workers) line 1-800-726-2743. Aside from leaving a message with information about bad dates on that line, you can also call that number 24/7 to receive support from trained sexual assault crisis response volunteers, through the Newfoundland and Labrador Sexual Assault Crisis and Prevention Centre. All volunteers have been trained by SHOP staff, and the line is sex worker positive.