Where the ladies of the evening are at these days
A member of the elite Universal Hub bicycling team reports:
Sunday night, riding my bike down Washington Street, I saw prostitutes hanging around in the doorway of Turner Furniture, near the corner of Marcella Street. I ride that route almost every night, and had never seen that before. I called the police, who said they were sending a car to check it out.
And how can we be sure they were those sorts of ladies?
Ladies in short short, short tops, hanging out in *very* dark doorways with men very close to them, and at least one couple was exchanging bills as I rode past. Around 10:30pm. I certainly don't know for sure, but whatever they were doing, it was very sketchy. Also, some shady looking characters on the sidewalk right there. The guys playing dominoes in front of the grocery shop looked as normal as ever.
Comments
Something doesn't sound right
A cyclist actually stopped at a red light long enough to scope out these sketchy characters? (Kidding...)
Note Adam's Intro
This was a member of the UHub cycling team - they obey traffic rules and wear helmets (and call the cops on sketchy activity - and then post about it!).
So now when a cyclist wearing
So now when a cyclist wearing a helmet and stopping at red lights in Roxbury is shot, we'll know why. Rolling snitches get stitches.
Considering the way clothes
Considering the way clothes are today, they could just be normal girls.
Short skirts
I am always amazed at the short skirts you see in 25 degree (F) weather. But you don't see the short/small tops at the same time.
Hookerwear
Come to my neighborhood, you'll see BOTH. Some of these girls.. I mean if they bend over, we'd see ALL they have to offer. As I like to call it.. I see alot of "hookerwear" on the streets today.
Either its just gotten bad or I'm old.
The key phrase
"exchanging money". It isn't just the outfits, but the entire scene.
I've reported a couple of drug deals that I've seen from the seat of my bike - almost as if cyclists are invisible to people, yet we can actually see so much more.
In one instance, a car nearly ran over me changing lanes abruptly without looking to pull over for a right turn up an access roadway. I made my turn from the proper lane and was behind the vehicle as it pulled over a block up and a guy on a kid bike on the sidewalk wheeled up, put something in the passenger side window and then took a little package from the passenger seat.
It wasn't just the bad driving that made me suspicious. It was the entire situation.
Stop snitching
People need to mind their own business instead of trying to incite cops to use violence against peaceful people who aren't harming anyone.
You lead a charmed life if the biggest problems you have are witnessing other people make foolish decisions. Why ruin these people's lives by getting them ensnared in the criminal justice system. If you want to save someone from a life of prostitution or drug addiction or both, go engage that person and try to make a difference, like a compassionate human being.
People who call the cops in response to victimless crimes are evil.
Agree
While I might report a dangerous driver who cut me off in traffic, it's not my business whether someone is buying or selling drugs, or is engaging in prostitution.
Interesting idea
I see your point, but when do you and I (average citizens) have the training and judgement to know when it's appropriate TO call the cops. Does clergy and community activists support this mode of thinking?
I don't think small time drug dealing and prostitution is a victimless crime. Yes the small timer gets locked up and the prostitute not the pimp gets in trouble, but it's better to look the other way? What if the prostitute in 14?
When I would call the cops
If someone was being hurt, or threatened to be hurt, by the behavior I witnessed. For instance, a fistfight, a robbery, someone waving a knife, an out-of-control drunk driver, someone walking along smashing car windows, etc.
But for a private transaction between a willing buyer and a willing seller on a street corner? Never.
What if...
the "private transaction" was going down on your street? And then it continued to happen more and more so maybe everyday you would walk by these "private transactions". And then the violence comes, with stabbings and shootings and deals gone bad. And then someone in your family that you love is hurt and/or killed. Yeah. Right. Do not tell me that you would not be on the phone pretty darn quick before it escalated to the latter.
Damn right, Ron
Besides, if you are seeing some whore on the corner, it means she's not busy making her pimp money. He'll "correct" that outta her later when he "tunes her up" at the end of the night because she's light on her daily "deposit" to his "voluntary" account.
But, hey, what am I talking about? Prostitution has no victims, right? It's just completely willing women trading sex for cash with completely benign clientele. I mean, that's the impression I got from all of Phillip Markoff's exploits. Good for you, Ron. Let those enterprising young women keep their jobs...like the unemployment numbers in this country aren't bad enough. Shame on the rest of you for trying to keep them from their work!
Passing judgement on a world you know nothing about is...
a little strange. Sounds to me like you've seen a few too many episodes of "Baretta" on Nik-at-Night. While I have no love in my heart for pimps, and I've known many, I do have much love for a few of our local madams. At least they look out for their girls.
Yes, yes
I'm sure it's a veritable Best Little Whorehouse in Bromley Heath this person stumbled upon.
Nail the Johns then
Its been shown to be a lot more effective, since the customers are the ones who have the most to lose.
Too bad the Woburn Cops like to give johns a pass while prosecuting the vendors ... perhaps because they don't want to expose the extracurricular activities of their friends and colleagues?
I thought they were nailing the johns
Otherwise someone's not getting their money's worth.
I might not have noticed
...had the driver in question not tried to kill me with their car while yakking on a celphone and making an abrupt, illegal lane change to rendezvous with their pre-arranged connection, just off of I-93.
I might not have said anything had I thought it was a "minor personal transaction", such as a little baggy of green for small money.
Given the dangerious driving, however, and the fact that the courier dropped a sizeable parcel into the car and fished out a box the size of the ones that checks come in in exchange, I think there was reason to believe that this wasn't a harmless personal-size weed transaction. It looked like an organized distribution deal to me.
As for "stop snitching", you should mind your own business. If you like living in a crack infested shithole, by all means keep quiet. Others of us, even those who would like to see weed be legal, have thin tolerance for interstate trade in illegal and dangerous drugs in the neighborhoods we live in and pass through.
Being an expert on drug deals, I'm sure your keen eye
would know the difference between a weed transaction or a coke transaction or a meth transaction. While I somewhat admire your zeal, I've personally seen people like you end up having to move or worse, on slabs. Think about your kids next time and mind your own business.
Shameful Coward
It doesn't matter what they were selling - it was serious dealer quantities of illegal substance (and yes, I was right about the transaction). Even huge quantities of pot, under the current regime, contribute to violence, blight, and death when people like you worship local gangsters.
If it were a little baggy, I'd have shrugged it. I've seen plenty of those deals go down when I worked over by Mission Hill and in Charlestown and Somerville and Cambridge and Brookline and Medford, too.
How the hell would they ever track me anyway? It wasn't my neighborhood but one nearby. The exchange took place right in front of me because they were oblivious to my cycling down the street in the first place, and to others in cars and on bikes. The driver was pulled over somewhere further away later in time, and the house was investigated sometime after. So sad that you think you know everybody in the world and where they live - in your two square block world, maybe.
You do not know my background, you do not know my experience or training in the past. I've lived in "troubled" places before, and I do understand why people fear cops and don't always trust them either. I've also seen what happens to kids - even "good kids with good parents" in such places - they get caught up or wind up as collateral damage if they can't escape soon enough. I also know what a suspicious transaction looks like - and drug deals are a hell of a lot easier to spot from a bike.
People like you are responsible for the Code of Silence Murders and terrorism of neighborhoods past and present. You are responsible for Whitey Bulger's 19+ murders, his going free for so long, and the current crop of shoot downs. You are responsible for a lot of other mother's kids dying, as you make murder acceptable. You should be ashamed of yourself for your foolish cowardice.
I must thank you..
I, for one, am enjoying the fact that I have raised your ire to the point where you have written a response so utterly devoid of anything resembling clear thinking. Thank you again for allowing me a few minutes of control over your emotions.
Keep up the good work.
Well then
Next time I see someone burning a pile of junk mail and leaves on the porch of a 12-family tenement, I'll mind my own business and hope it is your house, dvjackoff. No calling the fire department, no jotting down the plate number of the man setting it as he leaves ahead of the sirens, no worrying about the two dozen people inside - they want to die nobly, if horribly, for your ideals of silence. I'm sure their families will be thrilled that I didn't ruin some poor young arsonist's life.
Is the world you want to live in? If so, keep it in your world - e.g. your mommy's basement.
Fire-setting is a crime with victims
Obviously everyone has a duty to report fires and arsonists, who endanger lives and property. This isn't the same thing at all as the situation you described earlier.
Massive Drug Deals
These have victims too, and they raise the crime level of the entire neighborhood. If you have ever lived somewhere where people started cooking meth and shooting at each other and incinerating their homes in tightly packed neighborhoods, maybe you would get the distinction. Simply a matter of scale - and the things people do for big money in a black market. If you note the history of Prohibition, the problems that cropped up around black market alcohol aren't any different. The activities that large black market transactions ultimately create are certainly not victimless.
Check that..
let's change that line to read "hours of control over your emotions".
dvdoff
You crack me up. Good stuff.
Not following the logic
You would shrug off a small transaction, but call police if you witness a large transaction. I have to figure that the vast, vast majority of small transactions started off as large transactions. You'd call the police if you witness a distributor buying, but not a distributor selling. I don't really follow.
If you share a joint with a neighbor ...
That won't likely blow up your house, your neighbor's house. It won't likely result in gunfire, etc. If your neighbor is running a distribution point for drugs, the illegality and money involved bring much greater hazards.
I'd far rather certain drugs would be legal because it removes the black market and controls access. However, governments have pronounced themselves immune to scientific reasoning, and the consequences of the black market remain.
Ok
OK, sure, sharing a joint with a neighbor won't result in your house being blown up, but how do you know someone's house didn't get blown up some place higher up on the supply chain? But my comment didn't come from your having said anything about calling the police on a neighbor smoking a joint, nor did it have anything to do with legalizing marijuana and/or other drugs. Your original comment was about distributors, and, it seems to me, not so much about buyers. So I still don't follow the logic of busting a distributor based on the amount they are selling in any given transaction.
..er..
I suspect there are some folks who would not agree that prostitution is a victimless crime. I'm not a big cop defender, but I hope that 9 times out of 10 calling the cops about something isn't equivalent to inciting them to violence. I hope...
Prostitution is hardly a victimless crime
Prostitution is the source of human trafficking so it's hardly a victim-less crime. That said, we should legalize it so we can protect prostitutes from human traffickers and abuse. It's one of the oldest professions around and its not going to go away by making it illegal.
+1
I've got nothing to add.
Great point. Where do you
Great point. Where do you live? I need to throw away five used condoms. Your doorstep would be a great place for it. Ask the people in the South End who lived there in the 70's/80's if having prostitutes on their street was a problem. Victimless crime? Trafficing in persons (slavery) should be illegal. This is not "Moonlighting" or "Risky Business". These women are modern day slaves who will eventually die from this "innocent" crime.
Moonlighting?
I bet you're thinking of Night Shift, where Fonz runs a brothel out of his taxi, or something like that.
Exactly.
Exactly.
or the "Slut-Walk"?
"Considering the way clothes are today, they could just be normal girls."
or the "Slut-Walk"?
Fair warning.
I snitch.
Well...
...then ferchrissake dispose of the condom properly.
...worse than banana peels...