Sex Work and Occupational Homicide: Analysis of a U.K. Murder Database

• Author: Lucy Platt,Stewart Cunningham,Teela Sanders,Pippa Grenfell,P.G. Macioti
• Published date: 01 August 2018
• Date: 01 August 2018
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/1088767918754306
• Subject Matter: Articles

https://doi.org/10.1177/1088767918754306

Homicide Studies

2018, Vol. 22(3) 321 –338

© 2018 SAGE Publications

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DOI: 10.1177/1088767918754306

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Article

Sex Work and Occupational

Homicide: Analysis of a U.K.

Murder Database

Stewart Cunningham1, Teela Sanders1, Lucy Platt2,

Pippa Grenfell2, and P.G. Macioti2

Abstract

This article presents an analysis of occupational homicides of sex workers in the

United Kingdom, 1990-2016. Characteristics of 110 people murdered between 1990

and 2016 are explored including the location of their murder, ethnicity, migration

status, and gender. Key changes over time are noted including an increase in the

number of sex workers murdered indoors as well as an increase in murdered migrant

sex workers. By developing the concept of “occupational homicide,” we argue that sex

worker homicide should be viewed as an occupational issue and that the distinction

between work-related homicide and nonwork-related homicide should be accounted

for in future studies and is essential to inform prostitution policy.

Keywords

sex work, prostitution, murder, work-based homicide, occupational homicide, serial

killer

Introduction

In the literature on sex work and homicide, a consistent theme is the extraordinarily

high risk of murder faced by those who sell sex. It has been estimated that cis-gendered

female sex workers in the United States are 18 times more likely to be murdered than

women of the same age and race from the general population (Potterat et al., 2004,

p. 782) and are often targeted by serial offenders (Quinet, 2011).1 In a U.K.-based study

of sex workers in London, cis-gendered female sex workers’ mortality rate was recorded

1University of Leicester, UK

2London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, UK

Corresponding Author:

Teela Sanders, Department of Criminology, University of Leicester, 154 Upper New Walk, Leicester,

Leicestershire LE17QA, UK.

Email: Teela.sanders@leicester.ac.uk

754306HSXXXX10.1177/1088767918754306Homicide StudiesCunningham et al.

research-article2018

322 Homicide Studies 22(3)

as 12 times higher than women from the general population and murder was identified

as one of the leading causes of death (Ward, Day, & Weber, 1999, p. 342).

This article will review the existing literature on sex work–related murder, from

North America and the United Kingdom, with a more detailed focus on the United

Kingdom. Findings from our own database of sex worker murders in the United

Kingdom occurring between 1990 and 2016 will also be presented.

Sex Work Laws in the United Kingdom and the United States

As this article focuses on the U.K. context, it is important to first set out the country’s

legal approach to sex work. First, it is not a crime for two consenting adults to sell or

pay for sex. However, there are many laws (often dating back to the 1950s) relating to

how sex is bought and sold, that make it a quasi-legal (or quasi-criminal) activity.

There are soliciting, kerbcrawling, and various nuisance-related offenses that can be

used against both clients and sex workers on the street (Feis-Bryce, 2018). In terms of

indoor sex work, brothel-keeping laws make it illegal for two or more sex workers to

share premises, and third parties (such as receptionists, drivers, security) can be crimi-

nalized through procuring laws and laws against living off the earnings of prostitution.

Hence, the law means that much of the sex industry remains shrouded in secrecy, and

there is evidence of reduced legal consciousness among many sex workers as the law

is so complex and confusing (Graham, 2017; Klambauer, 2017). Yet many people

circumvent these laws by working as independent escorts, advertising a range of ser-

vices (focused on time and not sexual services) through a multitude of digital spaces

and methods (Sanders, Scoular, Campbell, Pitcher, & Cunningham, 2018).

The quasi-legal situation in the United Kingdom, which pushes the sex industry

into the informal economy and away from any mode of regulation, can be compared

to the laws in the United States, which are predominantly examples of full criminaliza-

tion. Aside from the legalized brothels of Nevada (Brents, Jackson, & Hausbeck,

2010), and despite the federal state system, which gives states freedom to set their own

laws, the general approach across the United States is that buying and selling/organiz-

ing commercial sex is illegal. Like in the United Kingdom, there are often a host of

laws which also criminalize the activities around the selling of sex: pandering, procur-

ing, promoting prostitution, solicitation, or agreeing to engage as a seller or buyer.

However, the differences are most likely in the enforcement of the laws, as the United

States appears to be stringent in their efforts to arrest, prosecute, and imprison whereas

the United Kingdom approaches range from enforcement (fines not prison) to harm

reduction and welfare/protection approaches including the first managed street sex

work zone (see Sanders & Laing, 2018).

Method

U.K. Sex Worker Murder Database

We analyzed a database of known murders of sex workers occurring in the United

Kingdom from 1990 to 2016. The database was started by grassroots practitioners in