Extensive research documents that female sex workers (FSWs)
in Russia are very vulnerable to abuses from police, including police sexual
coercion. However, despite qualitative data suggesting abusive policing
practices are more likely for FSWs contending with substance abuse issues and
risky sex work contexts, there is a paucity of quantitative study evaluating
these associations specifically in terms of police sexual coercion. Such
research is needed to guide structural interventions to improve health and
safety for FSWs in Russia and globally.
The purpose of this study is to assess the prevalence of
police sexual coercion among FSWs from two Russian cities, St. Petersburg and
Orenburg, and to determine whether riskier sex work behaviors and contexts and
substance use behaviors, including both IDU and risky alcohol use, are
associated with increased risk for sexual coercion from police
FSWs in St. Petersburg and Orenburg were recruited via
time-location and convenience sampling and completed structured surveys on
demographics (age, education), sex work risks (e.g., violence during sex work)
and substance use. Logistic regression analyses assessed associations of
substance use and risky sex work with police sexual coercion, adjusting for
demographics.
Participants (N=896) were aged 15 and older (94% were 20+
years). Most (69%) reported past year binge alcohol use, and 48% reported IDU
the day before. Half (56%) reported 4+ clients per day. Rape during sex work
ever was reported by 64%. Police sexual coercion in the past 12 months was
reported by 38%. In the multivariate model, both current IDU and past year binge alcohol use were
associated with police sexual coercion, as was selling sex on the street (not
in venues) and rape during sex work.
Current findings document the substantial role police sexual
violence plays in the lives of FSWs in Russia. These findings also highlight
heightened vulnerability to such violence among self-managed and substance
abusing FSWs in this context. Structural interventions addressing police
violence against FSWs may be useful to improve the health and safety of this
population...
The prevalence of police sexual coercion among FSWs in this
sample from two Russian cities appears to be quite widespread, with more than
one in three (38%) reporting such victimization, corroborating previous smaller
scale quantitative and qualitative studies that show sexual violence against
sex workers from police is highly pervasive in Russia (Aral, et al., 2003; Crago, et al., 2008; Decker, et al., 2012; Rhodes, et al., 2008;Stachowiak, et al., 2005). Such violence was
substantially more likely to appear in the context of St. Petersburg relative
to Orenburg, with 83% of FSW having experienced such violence were St.
Petersburg residents. Such higher rates of sexual violence from St. Petersburg
may be attributable to this city having more street sex work occurring; street
sex work was found to place FSWs at greater risk for police sexual coercion in
the current study. As street sex work in St. Petersburg is more likely to be
self-managed and involve injection drug use (Smolskaya, et al., 2004; USAID/Stellit, 2007), these sex workers are
likely more vulnerable to police violence. Notably, rape in sex work is also
linked to increased risk for sexual violence from police; this higher risk for
rape in sex work may again be attached to heightened risk for self-managed sex
workers due to their greater visibility, as has been seen in research in other
settings (Decker et al., 2010;Harcourt & Donovan, 2005; Maher et al., 2011; Rhodes, et al., 2008; Shannon & Csete, 2010; Shannon et al., 2009; Shannon et al., 2009). The current finding
that having someone manage your sex work decreased risk for police sexual
coercion is notable as previous research has consistently described lack of
autonomy among FSWs as linked to increased sexual risk for HIV(Church, Henderson, Barnard, & Hart, 2001;Decker, et al., 2010; May, Harocopos, & Hough, 2000; Prabhakar
Parimi, Mishra, Tucker, & Saggurti, 2012; Silverman, 2011; Silverman et al., 2011). However, the current
findings suggest that even when FSWs self-manage themselves, they remain
vulnerable to external control by police. While pimps and madams are often
thought of as traffickers and generally as perpetrators who take advantages of
FSWs, they have also been known to offer protection, support, and improve
access to health services (Aral, et al., 2005).
Beyond these structural factors of location and
self-management as risks for police sexual coercion, substance use involvement
also significantly increased the likelihood of sexual coercion from police. In
Orenburg, where injection drug use was less common, binge alcohol use was
associated with police sexual coercion; this association was not seen in St.
Petersburg. In St. Petersburg, where the vast majority of street based sex
workers are injection drug users, the street sex work factor eliminates the
effect of injecting drugs upon the likelihood of sexual coercion from police.
These findings are consistent with prior research documenting police sexual
violence among substance using FSWs, both in India (Erausquin, Reed, & Blankenship, 2011)
where alcohol risk was reported, and in Mexico where drug injection was
reported (Beletsky et al., 2012;Miller et al., 2008; Silverman, et al., 2011)...
By:
1NGO Stellit, 197101 St. Petersburg,
Russian Federation
2Deviance and Social control, The
Sociological Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences, 198005 St.
Petersburg, Russian Federation
3Division of Global Public Health, School
of Medicine, University of California at San Diego, 92093-0507 La Jolla, CA,
USA
4Center on Global Justice, University of
California at San Diego, 92093-0507 La Jolla, CA, USA
5Boston University, School of
Medicine/Boston Medical Center, Department of Medicine, Section of General
Internal Medicine, Clinical Addiction Research and Education, 02118 Boston, MA,
USA
Correspondence to: V Odinokova ; Email: ur.xednay@1ynorev
More at: https://twitter.com/hiv_insight
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