Arrest Records

Employers, schools, the military, convention organizers, and other individuals or groups often exert significant informal influence over prostitution clients' conduct. You can leverage this influence by seeking such third parties' cooperation to discipline clients who come to police attention. This strategy is not intended merely to shame clients, but rather to change their behavior through disciplinary systems outside the formal justice system. Keep in mind that some forms of discipline, such as employment termination, can be severe.

In addition to routinely enforcing prostitution laws, the police often conduct intensive arrest campaigns against prostitutes, clients or both. These campaigns significantly increase the risks of arrest, at least temporarily, bringing large numbers of prostitutes and clients into the formal justice system. When combined with media coverage, the campaigns are intended to deter those arrested from offending again, and to deter potential clients. The campaigns’ deterrent value wears off over time, however. In high-volume arrest campaigns, the chances that police will arrest innocent people increase, unless they take special precautions. Without some follow-up court intervention or measures to change the environment, intensive enforcement campaigns only temporarily interrupt street prostitution, or move it elsewhere; they do not shut down a street prostitution market entirely.