The above accounts relate onh' to on-street prostitution which is the most visible and also most lik e ly to cause concern because o f its public nature. However, there is also a body o f law that relates to off-street prostitution, that is, that which takes place in a specific property.
The chief legal control over the practice o f prostitution concerns the use o f brothels and other premises fo r the purposes o f habitual prostitution. There is no statutory definition o f'b ro th e l' but the term has a definite meaning at common law. It has been, and still is, an offence at common law to keep a brothel, fo r which the offender is punishable at the discretion o f the court (Sion 1977:122). Bv the Crim inal Amendment A ct 1885 s 13,
3s.HI : ’..every common prosiiuiie wuiulermg in the public sireeis or public highways, or in any place o f public resort, and behaving in a riotous or indecent manner shall be deemed an idle and disorderly person.... and it shall be law I'ul lor any Just ice of the Peace to comm it such offender to a house o f correction' Vagrancy A ct 1S24.
^ street' includes any bridge, road, lane, footway, subway, square, court, alley or passage, whether a thoroughfare or not, which is lor the time being open to the public: & the doorways and entrances of premises abutting on a street and any ground adjoining and open to a street, are treated as form ing part o f the street (Street Offences Act 1959 s. 1(4)). Conduct amounting to soliciting by prostitutes on a balcony or at a window o verlm king the street is soliciting in the street'. Smith v Hughes [1960].
^ Public place' is not defined in the Street Offences Act 1959 but must presumably be construed ejusdcm g en e ris with the extended definition o f street' (Halsburys Laws 1979 para 1071 footnote 4). In R v Wellard 118X4 j Grove J said ' A public place is one where the public go, no matter whether they have a right to go or not'
re-enacted in the Sexual Offences Act 1956 ss. 33-36, it is a summary offence fo r a person not only to keep or manage, or assist in the management o f a brothel, but also to let premises in whole or in part knowing that they are to be used as a brothel, or for an occupier to permit them to be so used.
A t common law a brothel is the same as a bawdy house. A bawdy house is a house or room or set o f rooms in any house kept fo r the purposes o f prostitution. In R v Holland, Lincolnshire [ 1882] Lopes J described a brothel as a place that permits people o f the opposite sexes to come there and have illic it sexual intercourse. Therefore before a premises can be said to be a brothel, people o f both sexes, in the plural must go there (Lord Parker, Gorman v Standen [1963] ). Premises frequented by men fo r intercourse w ith only one woman is not a brothel (Singleton v Ellison [1895]) whether the woman is a tenant or not (Caldwell v Leech 11913]). Where two women use the premises fo r prostitution the fact that one is the tenant does not prevent the premises being a brothel (Gonnan v Standen f 1963]). It is not necessary that the women using the premises are known to be prostitutes or that payments are made to them (W inter v W oolfe [1931]), but evidence that the women are prostitutes is admissible on the question whether premises are brothel (R v Korie 11966]). It is not necessary to prove that 'normal sexual intercourse’ has taken place (K ell)' v Purvis [ 1982])^.
It is not necessar}' that the use o f the premises should have caused a nuisance to
neighbours (R \ Holland. Lincolnshire 11882]) or that indecency or disorderly conduct should be apparent from outside. Where premises are used by more than one prostitute for her trade, the question whether the premises or part o f the premises is a brothel is a question o f fact in each case to be deduced from the whole: the mere fact that individual rooms were let under separate tenancies for exclusive occupation by one woman does not o f itse lf preclude the whole or part o f a house from being a brothel (Donovan v Gavin 119651).
In addition to these constraints relating directly to brothels there are other laws restricting prostitutes' actions in specific premises, particularly places o f refreshment. In this instance it is the landlord or tenant who commits a summary offence by know in gly perm itting common prostitutes to assemble at or continue in any house, room or other place o f public resort kept by them fo r the sale or consumption o f refreshments o f any kind. These laws can be found at s.44 M etropolitan Police A ct
1839, s.35 Town Police Clauses Act. ss.l4,15 Licensing A ct 1872 and more recently at s.9(1) Late Night Refreshment Houses .Act 1969 where it is an offence fo r the licensee to permit prostitutes on the premises. Under 1964 Licensing Act s. 175 (amended by the
^ Ackncr LJ in Kelly v Pur\ is 119821 'ii is not essential that there be evidence that normal sexual intercourse is prox ided in the premises. It is sulTicient to prove that more that one woman offers herself as a participani in physical acts o f indecency for the sexual gratification o f men' p671.
Criminal Law Act 1977, Sch 6 and the Criminal Justice Act 1982 s.46) it is an offence for the holder of a justices' licence knowingly to allow their premises to be the habitual resort or meeting place by reputed prostitutes, whether the object is or is not prostitution (Rickman and Draycott 1991). It has been established through case law that prostitutes have the same rights to refreshment as other people; however it becomes an offence if prostitutes habitually make use of the same premises and remain longer than necessary for reasonable refreshment {ibid. para 6-480 footnote 6).