#decrimnow — Public Fediverse posts

«Statement: Justice for the victims of Simon Levy means more than a conviction. It must mean change»

https://prostitutescollective.net/statement-justice-for-the-victims-of-simon-levy-means-more-than-a-conviction-it-must-mean-change/

> Sheryl Wilkins was murdered by Simon Levy—a man who had previously attacked women, had been convicted of violence against women, had been investigated in connection with the murder of Carmen Valencia Trujillo, and was nevertheless released on bail. Just four months later, he murdered Ms Wilkins.

> Women in our network who worked in the same area as Ms Wilkins say her death could have been prevented if the police had prioritised sex workers’ safety over the criminalisation and persecution of sex workers. Instead, police operations like Clear, Hold, Build, led to women being harassed, arrested, displaced from familiar areas, subjected to ASBOs and closure orders, and treated as criminals rather than protected from violent men.

> ECP’s Niki Adams said:

> “This case must lead to real change. Sex workers’ safety must be prioritised. Violent men target sex workers because they think they will get away with it because our lives and our safety aren’t a priority. We face saturation policing and no protection. We demand a change in the law so that sex workers, most of whom are mothers, are no longer criminalised for working to make a living. The laws give the police justification for treating us like criminals. One woman was violently raped by Levy and when she reported it, she herself was prosecuted. What will happen to those police officers? Will they be prosecuted for treating her like that? A violent sexual predator and attacker like Simon Levy was freed again and again after attacking women because women’s lives and safety aren’t seen as a priority. The laws have to be changed so that sex workers are no longer criminalised and we can report violence without fear of arrest or fear of deportation for those of us who are migrant women.”

> Criminalisation of sex work pushes women into greater danger, forces us into unfamiliar places, and makes it easier for violent offenders to prey on us. We demand decriminalisation. We demand that sex workers lives are valued. We demand that no more lives are lost because women’s safety is treated as less important than enforcing unjust laws.

— English Collective of Prostitutes (ECP) 🇬🇧

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More of the coverage linked below. Some are explicit, discretion is advised.

«The Guardian: What the Simon Levy case tells us about the women the justice system keeps failing»
https://prostitutescollective.net/the-guardian-what-the-simon-levy-case-tells-us-about-the-women-the-justice-system-keeps-failing/

«BBC News: Police failings revealed as sex offender left free to murder and attack women»
https://prostitutescollective.net/bbc-news-police-failings-revealed-as-sex-offender-left-free-to-murder-and-attack-women/

«Video: ITV News – The full timeline: How double murderer Simon Levy was caught after years of crimes»
https://prostitutescollective.net/video-itv-news-the-full-timeline-how-double-murderer-simon-levy-was-caught-after-years-of-crimes/

«Video BBC News: How one of the most “dangerous and predatory” men was left free to kill»
https://prostitutescollective.net/video-bbc-news-how-one-of-the-most-dangerous-and-predatory-men-was-left-free-to-kill/

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Summary of the situation: sexual predator keeps being bailed out of any charges because police pays no mind to the women denouncing him, keeps upping the harassment, eventually turns to physical assault and rape choosing sex workers as victims under an assumption that no one would care* [he actually admitted to this], then an actual murder (of a sex worker), gets found but is bailed anyway because police is [beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep], then murders another sex worker.

* Which is proven right when police arrests a VICTIM while she tried to go to a hospital after being raped. For real. The rapist? Didn't even get a spank on the wrist for this one.

Y'know, maybe if police were less busy “““cleaning the streets””” and incarcerating sex workers for things like working together or just being there, actual murderers and rapists would have less room to operate… 😮‍💨

[For the record, this doesn't even require police to develop some minimal competency on their alleged jobs, just to stop making it harder on others. Police simply getting the hell away would overall be a net gain considering its actual effects on cases like this. This very one being an excellent example. :/
“But they eventually imprisoned him for life!” — yeah, after being complicit for years of negligence and the enforcement of harmful policies that made the worst scenarios possible in the first place. Hard pass.
There's a reason marginalized folk want as little to do with police as possible. These things are it.
No, I'm not going too hard on police here. If anything I'm going way too soft. There were freaking YEARS of evidence, it required TWO BLOODY MURDERS for them to START doing shit besides practically encouraging this. The very, very least would be to own their own shit.]

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PS: a few days ago I've been ranting about the new zonification policies in Adelaide (SA, AU)¹ and the calls for overpolicing sex workers in the Netherlands².

This? This is one (ONE!) of the reasons those are terrible measures.

When the attention is on sex workers' behavior, 1) it's not on real issues, and 2) sex workers end up having to work in more dangerous conditions in order to avoid it, so 3) you end up with a mix ripe for abuses like this.

Same with the “Nordic Model” shitbag or the “end demand” nonsense (which is the same bag with "baked by econmics, very siencific!" hastily scribbled somewhere) — there has yet any proposal from those whose implementation didn't begin with “get police on sex workers' asses”, and the next step usually boils down to “and hope it magically does something”. That "something" only ever materializes as "harasses sex workers further"… 😮‍💨

#DecrimNow, dangit!

¹ On Adelaide's zonification proposal: https://kolektiva.social/@yenndc/117148955523663368

² On moral panics in the Netherlands: https://kolektiva.social/@yenndc/117140698028564710

#EnglishCollectiveOfProstitutes #GenderViolence #PoliceNegligence #UK #GBV #Criminalization #SexWork #EndGBV #AbolishPolice #August2026