well I ran into a lady i used to see reg. she isnt working anymore. she left cause they were closed down for living of the aveals of prostituion of a common bawdy house, I just dont get it. how can they get busted when it was so clean no drugs etc etc. as far as i know there wasnt a big profit they only took just enough to cover the rent and advertising from the girls. any good lawyers out there that can be recommended who know the ins and outs? why so many get left alone and others dont? I did tell her my favorate coffee shop that i hang out at incase she changes her mind and works again..... I bet she is really thinking about it.
laws?
- Thread starter ready set go
- Start date
Maybe she's just taking the time off to protest another stupid, irrelevant law? Kind of like the teachers...
ready set go said:
I'm a lawyer, but not a very good one, so I can't help you personally
In all seriousness, I'm too busy, but I can provide you with the names of some outstanding lawyers in private. They are somewhat expensive though, (400 - 500 an hour) but they'll get the job done. If you want more info send me a "friendly" PM.
Now knowing Diss is a Lie-er, Willie the Scribe has shown once more things are the same in the 1600s as nowDiscombobbled said:I'm a lawyer, but not a very good one, so I can't help you personally
In all seriousness, I'm too busy, but I can provide you with the names of some outstanding lawyers in private. They are somewhat expensive though, (400 - 500 an hour) but they'll get the job done. If you want more info send me a "friendly" PM.
WTF are you talking about Mick? Who the fuck is Willie the Scribe, and what does the 1600s have to do with anything? If you're mad because I asked you if you're cleaning your guns then so be it. But don't bring Willie the Scribe into the mattermick_eight said:
Willie wouldn't like it. On the issue of who is a good lawyer... I take it you are talking about the Lower Mainland? If so, the best criminal defence lawyers in this jurisdiction are generally regarded as including (but not limited to):ready set go said:
Richard Peck, QC
Bill Smart, QC
P. Michael Bolton, QC
Gill MacKinnon, QC
Glen Orris, QC
Russ Chamberlain, QC
David Crossin, QC
Ian Donaldson, QC
Terry Laliberte, QC
Peter Wilson, QC
Richard Fowler
David Butcher
Realistically... I doubt it is worth it for your friend to retain any of these guys. Just too expensive. I would need to know what the accused is charged with etc. to really be able to help you. Are there any criminal charges at all, or did they just close the place down and not charge anyone criminally? If that is the case then it is probably a licencing/zoning/health/City Hall -type issue. Was the place licenced or no?
Some good defence lawyers that might be a bit more reasonably priced:
Kevin Woodall
Michael Tammen
Greg Delbigio
James Sutherland
On the issue of what the law is in this area... I posted some stuff in a thread called COPS IN BBY awhile ago in response to some questions from a fellow perbert. I can re-post those blurbs here. Keep in mind that there are two issues: (1) whether the place in question is a "common bawdy house" and (2) whether the accused was "living off the avails of prositution".
All of the prostitution-related stuff in the Criminal Code in in "PART VII - Disorderly Houses, Gaming and Betting." You can look at the sections here:
http://laws.justice.gc.ca/en/C-46/42557.html
The prostitution related stuff is sections 210 to 213. That is pretty much it. If you want to start talking about proceeds of crime and related topics then the situation gets a lot more complicated.
I will re-post my stuff of AMPs as bawdy houses below.
Good luck!
Someone is interested in the issue of what is "private" and what is "public" in terms of a place to communicate for the purposes of prositution.
The second question is when does an establishment become a "common bawdy-house", i.e., how much bawdy-badness has to go on before it gets such a naughty legal label?
I'll deal with the second one first... to the extent I can.
There is a 1978 Ontario Court of Appeal case which held that evidence that, on two occasions on the same night, employees of a massage parlour offered to perform "indecent" acts with customers was insufficient to establish that the premises were habitually resorted to for such acts and, there being no other evidence of "habitual use" in this case, the accused were acqitted of the offence under s. 210. This case is called R. v. Ikeda and Widjaja if anyone is interested.
This suggests to me that the test for "common bawdy-house" is pretty tough for the Crown to meet. If the police are going to gather evidence for a common bawdy-house charge, it seems that they are going to have to have a lot of evidence over an extended period of time.
An "incall location" would seem to be even more difficult to establish as a common bawdy-house, which is probably why there are so few of these cases out there. It's just too hard to build a case of "habitually resorted to for such acts." The police would rather take the easy way out and try to shut the place down on licencing and by-law grounds, with the assistance of City Hall, if the AMP has becomes a thorn in their side.
There was another interesting case I was looking at, which may be of interest to my PM friend... the summary says:
A hotel may be found to be a common bawdy-house notwithstanding that not every room is used for the purposes of prositution where evidence is led that during a two-week period, on over 100 occassions, prostitutes were seen to be bringing their customers to the hotel and to a certain floor of the hotel. This is from a B.C. Court of Appeal case called R. v. Tremblay from 1980 (again, from back when they still tried to prosecute these offences rather than resorting to licencing shut downs and low-level harrassment of patrons).
Both these cases suggest to me that to be a common bawdy-house, it has to be habitual, and by that the courts means really habitual. Not just 2-3 guys a day coming over to an SP's house.
Outcall avoids the Criminal Code alltogether (the public place and bawdy-house aspects that is, if not the procuring, pimping, living off the avails, under 18 stuff), but on this reading of the law.... a single SP working out of a residence or discrete, low traffic, poon place will avoid the Code as well.
On the issue of what is private and what is public, the best guide is to look at the definition in s. 213(2):
"public place" includes any place to which the public have access as of right or by invitation, express or implied, and any motor vehicle located in a public place or in any place open to public view.
When you think of this in terms of an SP's home, incall location, or a hotel room... it doesn't work. The public does not have access as of right to any of these places.... nor by invitation, express or implied.... An implied right of access would be an "open for business, come on in"-type situation, like an AMP or the local 7-11. It is private property but you have an implied right of access. It does not mean "the owner or occupier of the property has invited you over for a visit". If that were the case then all our homes would be "public places", when in reality the dwelling house is the gold standard of what is not public in our society. Our law considers the home to be a refugee from the public, hence the need for search warrants, warrant to arrest in a dwelling house, etc. all the other special protections for dwelling places.
So, ghostie's final call is that while s. 213 may, however difficult to establish, have some application to an AMP situation, it has no application to an SP's home, incall location, or a hotel room...
The second question is when does an establishment become a "common bawdy-house", i.e., how much bawdy-badness has to go on before it gets such a naughty legal label?
I'll deal with the second one first... to the extent I can.
There is a 1978 Ontario Court of Appeal case which held that evidence that, on two occasions on the same night, employees of a massage parlour offered to perform "indecent" acts with customers was insufficient to establish that the premises were habitually resorted to for such acts and, there being no other evidence of "habitual use" in this case, the accused were acqitted of the offence under s. 210. This case is called R. v. Ikeda and Widjaja if anyone is interested.
This suggests to me that the test for "common bawdy-house" is pretty tough for the Crown to meet. If the police are going to gather evidence for a common bawdy-house charge, it seems that they are going to have to have a lot of evidence over an extended period of time.
An "incall location" would seem to be even more difficult to establish as a common bawdy-house, which is probably why there are so few of these cases out there. It's just too hard to build a case of "habitually resorted to for such acts." The police would rather take the easy way out and try to shut the place down on licencing and by-law grounds, with the assistance of City Hall, if the AMP has becomes a thorn in their side.
There was another interesting case I was looking at, which may be of interest to my PM friend... the summary says:
A hotel may be found to be a common bawdy-house notwithstanding that not every room is used for the purposes of prositution where evidence is led that during a two-week period, on over 100 occassions, prostitutes were seen to be bringing their customers to the hotel and to a certain floor of the hotel. This is from a B.C. Court of Appeal case called R. v. Tremblay from 1980 (again, from back when they still tried to prosecute these offences rather than resorting to licencing shut downs and low-level harrassment of patrons).
Both these cases suggest to me that to be a common bawdy-house, it has to be habitual, and by that the courts means really habitual. Not just 2-3 guys a day coming over to an SP's house.
Outcall avoids the Criminal Code alltogether (the public place and bawdy-house aspects that is, if not the procuring, pimping, living off the avails, under 18 stuff), but on this reading of the law.... a single SP working out of a residence or discrete, low traffic, poon place will avoid the Code as well.
On the issue of what is private and what is public, the best guide is to look at the definition in s. 213(2):
"public place" includes any place to which the public have access as of right or by invitation, express or implied, and any motor vehicle located in a public place or in any place open to public view.
When you think of this in terms of an SP's home, incall location, or a hotel room... it doesn't work. The public does not have access as of right to any of these places.... nor by invitation, express or implied.... An implied right of access would be an "open for business, come on in"-type situation, like an AMP or the local 7-11. It is private property but you have an implied right of access. It does not mean "the owner or occupier of the property has invited you over for a visit". If that were the case then all our homes would be "public places", when in reality the dwelling house is the gold standard of what is not public in our society. Our law considers the home to be a refugee from the public, hence the need for search warrants, warrant to arrest in a dwelling house, etc. all the other special protections for dwelling places.
So, ghostie's final call is that while s. 213 may, however difficult to establish, have some application to an AMP situation, it has no application to an SP's home, incall location, or a hotel room...
here's my other bawdy house post
My PM friend asked me a follow up question... maybe we can help him or her out with it?
If a particualar hotel room or residence was used repetitively by "invited" undercover cops, informants etc. a common bawdy house charge might be established?
There are a couple more things I can point to without totally taking the day off and heading to the library
The "frequent or habitial use" idea comes from a 1968 Supreme Court of Canada case called R. v. Patterson. The Court found that the words "kept or occupied" or "resorted to" connote a frequent or habitual use of the premises for the purpose of prostitution. The Court referred tho three kinds of evidence which could be used to prove this frequent or habitual use:
1. Actual evidence of the continued and habitual use of the premises for prostitution...(this would be actual evidence of sex being provided ... probably obtained by undercover cops or agents or people who, for whatever reason (immunity), decided to give such evidence).
2. Evidence of the reputation in the neighbourhood of the premises as a common bawdy-house (this would be basically the "neigbours" giving evidence that the place in question is well known as a poon palace... this probably has less impact now then back in the 60s or 70s if one of these was to go to trial)
3. Circumstantial evidence which would allow the court to properly draw the inference that the place in question was resorted to habitually as a place of prostitution. (I'm not 100% sure on this but I would think that a wide variety of evidence could be given on this basis: Are there a lot of guys coming in, staying for a hour and leaving, is the cash flow inconsistent with simply massages being provided, are there sex related items found inside that wouldn't normally be need for massages (large numbers of condoms, etc.)? Stuff like that - things which would allow the court to draw the inference that this is a CBH).
In the case of a particular hotel room, I think a CBH could be established, but the police would have to have the evidence to meet the rather stringent "continued and habitual use of the premises for prostitution" test. If we look at that Tremblay case I was mentioning above, then we could probably take over 100 visits in 2 weeks as a minimum to establish a place as a CBH. Undercover cops and agents, at least I think anyway, are not going to put that kind of effort into one agency working out of one hotel room. Anyone have any experience with something like that which they care to share?
The best answer I can come up with right now is that the police would have the following kinds of evidence to work with to establish a hotel room as a CBH:
The three kinds of evidence set out in Patterson (actual, reputation and circumstantaial);
The presumptions set out by s. 198(1)(a) and (d) - delaying or obstructing police officer from entering, and previous convictions for CBH offences.
The main thing going for the AMP/accused in this would be the "frequent or habitial use" idea, and how the courts have interpreted this to be something akin to almost "open and notorious" provision of the services of a prostitute.
Mamasans and Papasans, keep it discrete. Same applies to patrons and girls working there. The less open people are the harder it will be for the police to establish charges.
Another interesting note I found is that, apparently (although ghostie disagrees ) being found to be entering or leaving a common bawdy-house is sufficient to establish a charge of being "found in" a CBH
Note says: ...evidence that the accused was seen entering or leaving was sufficient to prove the offence, his presence in the bawdy-house not being the object of subsequent admission but by being discovered by the contemporaneous observation or inspection by police. R. v. Lemieux, 1991, Quebec Court of Appeal.
If that is still good law, or is law out West here... then that really sux!! The plain reading of 210(2)(b) would seem to require you to be found in the CBH, not observed to be walking in or out.
That raises the stakes boys... if police have been doing a long-term investigation into an AMP and feel that they have sufficient evidence to establish the place as a CBH, then any poor sap, according to this case anyway, walking in or out, could be subject to a charge under 210(2)(b)...
ghostie will have a look at this in more detail and get back... (except I never did this, as I just don't have the time right now )
My PM friend asked me a follow up question... maybe we can help him or her out with it?
If a particualar hotel room or residence was used repetitively by "invited" undercover cops, informants etc. a common bawdy house charge might be established?
There are a couple more things I can point to without totally taking the day off and heading to the library
The "frequent or habitial use" idea comes from a 1968 Supreme Court of Canada case called R. v. Patterson. The Court found that the words "kept or occupied" or "resorted to" connote a frequent or habitual use of the premises for the purpose of prostitution. The Court referred tho three kinds of evidence which could be used to prove this frequent or habitual use:
1. Actual evidence of the continued and habitual use of the premises for prostitution...(this would be actual evidence of sex being provided ... probably obtained by undercover cops or agents or people who, for whatever reason (immunity), decided to give such evidence).
2. Evidence of the reputation in the neighbourhood of the premises as a common bawdy-house (this would be basically the "neigbours" giving evidence that the place in question is well known as a poon palace... this probably has less impact now then back in the 60s or 70s if one of these was to go to trial)
3. Circumstantial evidence which would allow the court to properly draw the inference that the place in question was resorted to habitually as a place of prostitution. (I'm not 100% sure on this but I would think that a wide variety of evidence could be given on this basis: Are there a lot of guys coming in, staying for a hour and leaving, is the cash flow inconsistent with simply massages being provided, are there sex related items found inside that wouldn't normally be need for massages (large numbers of condoms, etc.)? Stuff like that - things which would allow the court to draw the inference that this is a CBH).
In the case of a particular hotel room, I think a CBH could be established, but the police would have to have the evidence to meet the rather stringent "continued and habitual use of the premises for prostitution" test. If we look at that Tremblay case I was mentioning above, then we could probably take over 100 visits in 2 weeks as a minimum to establish a place as a CBH. Undercover cops and agents, at least I think anyway, are not going to put that kind of effort into one agency working out of one hotel room. Anyone have any experience with something like that which they care to share?
The best answer I can come up with right now is that the police would have the following kinds of evidence to work with to establish a hotel room as a CBH:
The three kinds of evidence set out in Patterson (actual, reputation and circumstantaial);
The presumptions set out by s. 198(1)(a) and (d) - delaying or obstructing police officer from entering, and previous convictions for CBH offences.
The main thing going for the AMP/accused in this would be the "frequent or habitial use" idea, and how the courts have interpreted this to be something akin to almost "open and notorious" provision of the services of a prostitute.
Mamasans and Papasans, keep it discrete. Same applies to patrons and girls working there. The less open people are the harder it will be for the police to establish charges.
Another interesting note I found is that, apparently (although ghostie disagrees ) being found to be entering or leaving a common bawdy-house is sufficient to establish a charge of being "found in" a CBH
Note says: ...evidence that the accused was seen entering or leaving was sufficient to prove the offence, his presence in the bawdy-house not being the object of subsequent admission but by being discovered by the contemporaneous observation or inspection by police. R. v. Lemieux, 1991, Quebec Court of Appeal.
If that is still good law, or is law out West here... then that really sux!! The plain reading of 210(2)(b) would seem to require you to be found in the CBH, not observed to be walking in or out.
That raises the stakes boys... if police have been doing a long-term investigation into an AMP and feel that they have sufficient evidence to establish the place as a CBH, then any poor sap, according to this case anyway, walking in or out, could be subject to a charge under 210(2)(b)...
ghostie will have a look at this in more detail and get back... (except I never did this, as I just don't have the time right now
)For the record the whole trth and nutting but the truce. Willie the scribe is Will Shakesphere, lived in 1600s, wrote a few pages of prose.... my fave was " KILL ALL the lawyers'' sorry you haven't read him...If Willie were alive,I'm sure he would be disscombobbled that a icon like you hasn't noticed himDiscombobbled said:WTF are you talking about Mick? Who the fuck is Willie the Scribe, and what does the 1600s have to do with anything? If you're mad because I asked you if you're cleaning your guns then so be it. But don't bring Willie the Scribe into the matter
ghostie said:
Reasonable argument, however, the concept of living off the avails isn't entirely settled. The statute seems cut and dried (re living off the avails of another), yet some courts aren't applying it in that manner (Sask. Man). I'm not questioning your analysis, because it is competent, but I don't think it's entirely settled.
John Cheavers is a very good experiened lawyer and may be more the type of lawyer that would take on something like this.mick_eight said:
Have a look in the yellow pages. The very top people don't advertise, but many of the lawyers who advertise in the Yellow pages are extremely good, including:
Brian Mickelson
Tony Serka
Michael Sanders
John Buchanan
These are all very reputable people.
(as you can probably tell, there aren't a lot of women in this business. There are some, and I could give you some names if you want. Lots of women Crown Attorneys, but criminal defence seems to be mostly a guy thing)
Skakespeare? Why don't we talk about Aurilius or Cesear, Mick it's the 21st century! Move on man!mick_eight said:
Mick, if I want to go back in time, I'll let you know. I the meantime, I have to deal with nowmick_eight said:
Discombobbled said:Mick, if I want to go back in time, I'll let you know. I the meantime, I have to deal with now
well some people who arent in the sex trade and have addictions can bring people back to their place and not be charged unless it is a minor or rape, therefore hard to prove a sex trade worker. as if it is 5 customers or under in a day her arguement could be that she just likes sex. no different then the women who goes out to the bar every weekend and brings home someone different.
ready set go said:
so whats to stop me from going out and renting a place and hiring a bunch of girls? if i get propers licening....... hmmmmm
