Police Raid at Cuddles

A Black Country woman who helped run a brothel has been forced to sell her house bought with the proceeds.

Susan Richards was ordered to sell her home and pay back the £ 40,300 profit.

She remained in the public gallery and was emotionless as the order was made by Judge Michael Dudley at Wolverhampton Crown Court.

Richards, who helped run Cuddles massage parlour in Hagley Road, Bearwood, for prostitution between October 1998 and September 2005, was given six months to sell the cottage valued at £ 139,100 and pay back the equity.

Miss Heidi Kubik, defending, said Richards had real reservations at her ability to sell the property for the valuation figure.

Judge Dudley granted a maximum period of six months when he made the confiscation order for the proceeds of crime. He added failure to pay would incur a penalty of 15 months’ imprisonment.

Richards was sentenced to 250 hours unpaid work in August 2006. Richards’ former partner Carl Pritchett was jailed for two years.

Comment: I wonder how Judge Michael Dudley sleeps at night

Thanks to Alan

The unfortunate Mrs Richards was, at the time of the ludicrous raid on the brothel, described by a neighbour as "a very nice lady" who was terrified of going to prison because she didn't know what would happen to her cats. In addition to "unpaid work" - a bizarre euphemism for what might more accurately be called slave labour, Mrs Richards is now to be deprived of the home she bought through her honest work running a well-managed brothel in which prostitutes could work safely. In addition to the fall in property values which affects every home owner, the poor woman gets the double whammy of being thrown in prison if she can't raise enough from the sale.

I wonder how Judge Michael Dudley sleeps at night. What sort of person accepts appointment to a position which he must know will involve him in such appalling actions as this state theft?

Police withheld evidence that casts a serious question mark over the conviction of a Black Country man who is serving seven years for running a brothel, a court heard.

A judge said he was greatly distressed by the claim that officers did not disclose a witness statement in the case of Carl Pritchett, which suggested prostitutes were working at the Cuddles Massage Parlour in Bearwood voluntarily.

Pritchett's case is now being examined by the Criminal Cases Review Commission, and Judge Michael Dudley said he was writing to the country's top prosecutor over the revelations.

Pritchett was jailed for running Cuddles in Hagley Road in 2006. It followed a high media profile raid on the brothel in 2005 when police found 19 foreign women employed as sex workers. At the time, the police claimed to have 'rescued' trafficked girls but it turned out to be a well run brothel with willing, albeit foreign, girls. But it now appears that the police new before the raid that the girls had been working voluntarily at the brothel.

Pritchett appeared before Judge Michael Dudley at Wolverhampton Crown Court for a hearing under the Proceeds of Crime Act. Judge Dudley revealed Pritchett had handed him papers at a previous hearing, which he had now read. He said: There is information in there undermining the conviction, that the police were in possession of a statement revealing people were working in these premises voluntarily 16 days before the raid took place.

He said police had publicised the raid as an operation to rescue women who had been trafficked into the country, and that he was greatly distressed by the documents: I'm pretty sure I was told at the time of the trial there were no statements from prostitutes that in any way undermined the case. But there patently was, 16 days before the raid. It doesn't necessarily mean the conviction will be overturned but all I know is there is a serious question mark and it's blatant non-disclosure.

Comment: Slightly Contradictory

Press reports from a previous trial with the same judge suggested that Pritchett was jailed for 2 years. It was also established then that the girls weren't trafficked, and that the brothel was well run. Presumably this new revelation is more about the conduct of the police, rather than what was already apparent about the absence of trafficking.

Update: Straigtened

16th July 2011. Thanks to Alan

I think that the discrepancy arises because Pritchett originally got two years, but then got extra because he didn't cough up the amount of proceeds of crime determined - I know not how - by the court.