Brothel madam pleads guilty

A former hairdresser today admitted running a brothel at a two bedroom flat in Walsall which attracted hundreds of men a week and raked in thousands of pounds.

Samantha Louise Robinson, aged 32, appeared before Walsall Magistrates Court today to enter a guilty plea to a charge of keeping a brothel in Fellows Park Gardens, Bescot Road, between May 25 and July 7.

She also pleaded guilty to possession of cannabis, for which she was fined £50 and made to pay a surcharge of £15.

Robinson, dressed in a beige skirt and floral top, and with dyed blonde hair, will appear at Wolverhampton Crown Court on October 7 to face sentence for keeping a brothel.

The seedy business was uncovered by police after a series of complaints from neighbours fed up with the amount of cars parking outside the flats day and night.

During the raid on July 7 police found three women at the flat.

However, Robinson, of Highgate Road, Bescot, has since told the Express & Star she employed eight women in total who charged their own fees for their services which she then took a cut of.

Mr Colin Heald, prosecuting, told the magistrates today how women at the brothel were earning up to £2,000 a week between them.

As the business was likely to have earned more than £5,000 the magistrates had insufficient powers to pass sentence today. Sgt Gary Iliff, of Walsall police, who was responsible for the raid, said he was glad residents no longer had to put up with the problem.

He said the main complaints were about traffic chaos outside the flats when the brothel was busy.

He said: "We just hope that residents can have a bit of peace and quiet now."

Speaking after her brief appearance in court Robinson said she had got into the sex industry through prostitutes she knew in the area.

She said: "I will put this down to a bad experience."

Fortmere Properties, which owns the flats in Fellows Park Gardens, was criticised by residents for allowing a brothel to be set up on the site.

The company today apologised and said it would do all it could to stop anything similar happening in the future.

Miss Sumera Mehrban, sales and lettings administrator for Fortmere, said: "We are just happy it is over now. We do our best to vet tenants but until they are actually living there it is difficult to know exactly what they are like.

"We will do our best in the future to keep people like this away from our properties."