I’m beginning to wonder what’s happening in our lovely town lately, what with all the vandalism. Now we’ve got the police raiding a nail bar on suspected modern slavery in Cleveleys and human trafficking!
Police from the serious crime squad with the National Crime Agency raided three properties on Tuesday. One on the Prom at Blackpool, Church Street in the town centre and our own Victoria Road West. Derek told me about it yesterday and I was pretty shocked I must say, yes even I can be shocked. But what a horrible thing to do to anyone, what is the world coming to. The police arrested a 36 year old man and a woman aged 33. They were arrested on grounds of slavery, immigration and money laundering offences. This took place at a flat in Blackpool on the prom and seven victims were taken from there.
Modern Slavery in Cleveleys
The police said that the properties in Church Street and Cleveleys are businesses and were searched also yesterday. The police have been having a to-do haven’t they!
This kind of crime is ongoing in our area so if you are hiding someone in your attic, beware, the police will find you. Just joking, of course, as it is a serious offence. The police are asking the public to be vigilant and report any unusual activities to them and it will be looked into. Modern slavery involves recruiting and moving people and using threats, deception and coercion to exploit them. It can take many forms, the commonest being sexual exploitation, forced labour and domestic slavery. The victims have to work in various places like brothels, cannabis farms, nail bars, car washes, agriculture and even in people’s homes. You don’t know what’s going on under your nose do you. I wouldn’t have expected our town to be running a slavery racket, but someone has obviously told the tale on them, I would think.
Greed for Money
I couldn’t think of anything more horrible than all the things I’ve mentioned, especially the sex one, that is so degrading. Most of us have seen films, documentaries and programmes with real victims being forced to undergo this awful practice. To have to be made to work in a brothel doesn’t bear thinking about. It makes me wonder what kind of, I would say animals but they are better than the offenders, ‘people’ who can inflict all this misery for nothing more than greed for money. I don’t know how they sleep in their beds at night, but it doesn’t seem to bother them.
I know from television that there is a lot of domestic slavery and cruelty and the thing all these people have in common is that they have their freedom taken away and no control over their own lives. Money is scarce if they have any at all and a life of misery is in wait for them when they’re picked up by gang masters.
I’m sure we’d all agree that we want our town to stay the peaceful place it has been, and not be overtaken by all these sordid goings on that seem to be happening.
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