413047-Underground-Commercial-Sex-Economy

explained, “A lot of guys would give me $60 for not using a condom;” another noted that clients paid “$20
or $40 more for no condom.”
Respondents varied with respect to whether they would accept these higher fares and the associated
health risks for sex work without a condom. A 43-year-old from Dallas took the risk:
You get $20, $50. I mean it just depends on the guy, ‘cause it’s a lot of times somebody
offered me $20 and I run him off [refused to trade sex with him] cause they won’t wanna
wear condoms. And there was a lot of times I did sex without condoms, I mean. I'm just
glad I haven’t caught nothing yet. (M4)
Others were not willing to take this chance. Regarding sex acts without condoms, one respondent noted,
“That wasn’t cool; I wouldn’t do that” (J8).
Violence and Abuse
In interview after interview, sex workers described the violence they experienced or witnessed while
conducting street-based sex work. Twenty-one (58 percent) of the 36 respondents stated that they faced
some type of violence as a sex worker. Thirteen individuals (36 percent) described instances of having
abusive or violent clients. Moreover, it was noted that this violence became worse over time.
A number of sex workers were robbed by clients. One individual from Washington, DC explained that over
the course of her career, she “came into three robbery situations—with johns taking [my] money back”
after the sex work was conducted (L8).
Many respondents experienced more egregious levels of violence from clients. A Denver-based sex worker
was subjected to extreme physical violence in the 1990s, when she first started trading sex. She recounted
one incident and other similar experiences:
When I first started out something bad happened. He had a machete. He pulled in the
alley, and then pulled out the knife, and I cried, and prayed, and he took out the knife. He
hit me with the fist. I got up, and I said “God, please help me,” and it was snowing outside
that day … God gave me the strength to fight for life and get out of the car. I’ve got raped a
few times. (J2)
Another individual from Seattle described the effect of the death of her best friend, who also traded sex,
had on her decision to leave street work and see only regular clients:
I ran into a girl on … Amtrak … and we got to talking. I had drugs on me and we went to
the bathroom and—she was the same age—she called one of her tricks and he didn’t want
her, he wanted me. Then we became best friends. Then she got killed. And I just went to
regulars after that. I was working on the streets for two years before she got killed, but I
stopped working on the street after she got killed. They don’t know how she got killed.
(K3)
Sex workers who traded sex over the years noted that the sex work became even more dangerous in the
2000s, with more instances of client-induced violence. A 33-year-old respondent from Denver, who began
working in 2001, explained that sex work is “always dangerous.” She extrapolated:
I have a knife, because I was raped … once, and another guy tried. He had handcuffs, but I
fought back. He beat me up really bad though. I didn’t go to the hospital because I was
scared of my significant other finding out … I was most scared of a rapist—of getting
killed, or a serial rapist. (J7)
Another participant traded sex in Dallas throughout the 2000s. She was asked if she experienced
instances of abuse with clients. She responded,
Yes. I've got stab wounds all over me. I've been stabbed in my head, all up my legs, in my
kidney. I've been raped about 40 or 50 times. So I've been through all this stuff … ‘cause a
lot of times people will drive way out somewhere where you don’t know where you're at.
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