Police crackdown on Tooting Common prostitution

2:32pm Wednesday 12th November 2008

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A crackdown on kerb crawling and prostitution around Tooting Common has led to 20 arrests and cautions.

As a result of the blitz - which started after a rising number of complaints from residents and politicians - more families were using the area, police said.

During the two-month operation officers arrested eight prostitutes for loitering and gave cautions to another eight.

One man was arrested for absconding from a psychiatric hospital and another was arrested for breaching his probation.

Two other men are being prosecuted for indecency.

A Wandsworth Council spokesman said one of the prostitutes was a prolific offender and steps were being taken to obtain an antisocial behaviour order against her which would prevent her from entering the common and bordering streets.

He added as well as the arrests, a number of fallen tree trunks were removed from wooded parts of the common that were “being used to shield the activities of the prostitutes and their clients”.

PC Chris Cullen, of Wandsworth Council’s Parks Police, co-ordinated the crackdown in partnership with police safer neighbourhood teams.

He said the operation had led to a reduced the number of residents' complaints from four a day to “hardly any”.

Prostitution on the common dates back more than 100 years to the Boer War when thousands of British Army troops were camped on the common before being deployed to South Africa.

The act of prostitution itself is not illegal, but it is an offence to loiter or solicit for prostitution purposes.

Residents with complaints about the borough’s parks can contact Wandsworth's parks police 24 hours-a-day on 020 8871 7532.

• Have you noticed a difference in antisocial behaviour near the common? Let us know in the comments section below.