A Story from London

I was walking home the other night after seeing a friend. It was rainy and I saw this attractive lady come out of the side street dressed all in black and start walking on the other side of the main road I was walking on. She then started talking to some dodgy looking guy on my side of a road that I had just passed. It was late at night and this guy was being aggressive to her, so I stopped to see what the problem was. This guy who was drunk became aggressive towards me and this lady kept saying to me ‘it is ok, I live in the same block as him, go’. The worried looked in this woman’s eye and the violent look in this mans eye made me afraid, so I said to them I will go and started walking slowly when a thought came across my mind that I can't leave this woman by herself in the dark street with this man who I feel might physically attack her, so I crossed the street onto the other side and look inside my back pack for my pocket knife as I thought if this man attacks this woman I am going have to intervene. I had my mobile phone on me thought at that moment under that stress of the situation I didn't think of calling the police. I couldn't find my pocket knife though I found a pen and really thought as terrible as it might sound I might have stab this man in the eye with a pen if he comes after me or tries to hurt this woman as I was really fearing for both of our safety. I was scared I was even scared to walk down the road with my back turned to this man. Anyway this woman finished speaking to this man and crossed the road towards me and the aggressive man walked up the road away from us to my relief. I then said to this woman, 'Are you alright' and she said to me 'I live in the same hostel as him, I had an argument with him early today, he threatened to beat me up, you don't want to get mixed up with him, him and his friends smoke crack'. I must say that I never drink, so this is not me telling a drunken man story. I then said to this woman would she like to contact the police on my mobile phone and lay charge against him for the threats he made towards her, she said 'no, because I am also a bad girl, I have warrant against my arrest and I don't want to go back to the women’s jail'(She said the jails name but I can't remember it). We then went our separate ways and I was pretty down that she didn't want to contact the police to complain to them about this man. Thinking back now, what this woman said to me and how she tried to get me away from this aggressive man makes me believe this woman was not a violent dangerous criminal but properly involved in prostitution and maybe some drug taking. I feel the prison system has failed women like these, who have no protection from the law and don't feel they can approach the law because of them being call girls. The system need to be modified to protect women like these from violent criminals in prison who would bully them and protect from pimps, violent men. Someone who has done a non violent criminal act like prostitution or shoplifting etc should be given a helping hand out of that kind of life and not become sucked into the criminal world because of the prison system.

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