A leading Garda has vowed to crack down on prostitution in his town
after yet another brothel raid.
Detective Inspector Pat O’Donnell was speaking after officers raided
another brothel in Letterkenny.
He appealed to people to alert Gardai if they htink a brothel is
operating near them.
This week’s raid is the latest in a series on illegal sex-for-sale
apartments in the town.
One of those caught in the act was a 75 year old pensioner who was
having sex with a Romanian woman when Gardai raided a brothel on
Justice Walsh Road, a couple of hundred yards from the local
courthouse.
All prostitutes were advertising their services on the website Escort Ireland.
Today, a total of 13 prostitutes, including one transexual
prostitute, were still advertising their sex for sale services in the
town on the site.
Inspector O’Donnell appealed to local people to play their part in
cleaning up their town of illegal brothels.
“Local people are obviously concerned about this type of clientele
that these places bring round.
“I would like to appeal to people that, if they have any information
about brothels in the area, to report it to gardai and we can take
steps to deal with it.
“There are suspicious comings-and-goings with individuals hanging
around outside, on their phones, they disappear into the building and
reappear 20 minutes or half-and-hour later and it’s on a regular
basis, traffic coming, maybe late in the evening.”
He said that many of those women caught in brothels were doing so to
send money back to their home countries.
However, he said that in some cases women are being preyed upon.
He added: “We found that the girls who are involved in this, the vast
majority of them are involved on a voluntary basis and do it for their
own gain and the gain of their families in Romania.
“They move around a lot and we have different ones coming by bus and
car here to Letterkenny and they travel around the various towns in
Ireland.
“There are incidents, and this is what concerns us, of some being held
against their will and being brought here on the pre-text of getting a
god job, but then held against their will.”
