FORCED TO SELL SEX

Trade in human flesh has moved off the streets as traffickers make millions by promising a new life to women then selling them as sex slaves

- BY NORMAN SILVESTER

FIFTEEN years ago much of the street prostitution which blighted Scotland had disappeared.

Women were advertising their services online on adult websites from flats, hotels and even AirBnb.

There they could meet their clients in the relative safety of their own homes.

On the surface, it looked as though it was safer for the women and posed fewer problems for the police. A case of out of sight, out of mind.

But in many cases it was replaced by a far more serious problem for both the police and women - sex trafficking.

Organised crime groups were quick to see the riches to be made from selling sex on the new adult websites and controlling the women who supplied the services.

Victims were lured from their homes in Eastern Europe and Asia to Scotland with promises of a new life, only to be sold as sex slaves and a life of misery in flats turned into brothels.

Their services were then being advertised on the same adult websites as the new generation of women who had chosen to work there rather than on the streets.

For the police, one problem had been replaced with another.

A number of cases in the last year have shown the horrifying extent of the problem and the millions that the ruthless gangs are making.

In May, a police Proceeds of Crime investigation revealed how convicted sex trafficker Jagpal Singh, 55 - who duped Chinese women into travelling to Scotland and forced them into prostitution - had made over £2.6million from the evil trade in human flesh.