25/02/2013 Inside Out East

Break-up of the would rather go to jail than leave their home. They

have been told I have to go. I will take it on the chin, I elected to

take this route. Sometimes you have to take the consequences. Stand by

what we have done. I will go to prison, I will take what's coming,

that is the system. The trade in human misery, right on our

doorsteps. I came just to save my And have a photo found in Cambridge

is helping unlock the secrets of Stonehenge. I happened across this

picture, that was something very interesting to me. After I checked

it out, I realised it had been missed. They are the stories that

Tonight we are in Cambridge. Our first stories about a couple from

Essex, their home may not be picture-perfect, but they would

rather go to prison than leave it. They have been living in a

collection of tents for the last two years after losing their home.

We have been following the story over the last few months.

Dedham in Essex. Nestling alongside the grand houses here are a

collection of caravans and tents. This field, just a stone's throw

from the high street, has been home for the Pryke family for nearly two

years. They moved here from their three bedroom terraced home after

the family hit financial problems. A couple of friends offered us two

of the caravans and we bought that one ourselves. The problems started

when Gwen's husband's business went bust. The family were forced to

leave their home in Colchester. This is our toilet utility room

which is all very embarrassing, but we've been prevented by the council

from putting up a shed or anything. We don't want to keep it like this,

but as you see we do have a washing machine and flush toilet.

Prykes say they own this land, but the council say they don't have

planning permission to live here. What we've got here is a little

communal area. Gwen and myself are in this caravan here. Sadly, the

recent storms and stuff has taken its toll of some of the awnings.

But we're in there. We have the remains of tents that we first

moved in on. But with the winter we had to move out of those and bring

on the caravans. The council have taken legal action to remove the

caravans. But the Prykes have repeatedly refused. The court has

now told the couple they will go to prison for contempt. With an

injunction, defence is no... Ignorance is no defence. It doesn't

get us off. I don't know what to do. We were struggling anyway. Asa has

to go to prison and I will have to go to prison. What about now? Why

don't you just move off the land? I've got no-where to go. We weren't

able to find anywhere in the rentals before and I can't see how

I can possibly do that, I don't know what to do. I'll take it on

the chin. I elected to take this route. Sometimes you've got to take

the consequences of your actions. I'll standby by what we've done. I

still believe in what we've done and I'll go to prison. And yeah,

I'll take what's coming. The day after this interview Asa began a

four month jail sentence. The court decided that because of the

children, rather than both parents going to jail together, Gwen will

go when Asa's sentence ends. It's now been a couple of weeks since

Asa was taken away to start his prison sentence. Gwen is alone at

the camp site, her three children are at school. She's still shocked

by what's happened. It's very difficult. I'm prone to fear, fear

of the cold, and the wind and the rain, fear of the authorities, fear

for the future, anger and just very big worry about my children. Gwen

has just received the first letter from her husband. Dearest darling

Gwen, I trust this letter finds you all well, my last conversation with

you seemed to infer that we may have support now. But nothing can

alter the fact that the authorities chose to use the prison service as

a punishment. This will not reflect on our love or commitment to each

other. I desperately miss you and the boys. You must not fret though

about my predicament nor have anger towards the police or prison

service. Some local residents are angry that the Prykes are still on

the land. It's the council's responsibility to get them to leave.

At the council headquarters here in Colchester they say they've done

all they can to assist the family. The council has offered the Prykes

temporary accommodation, both in and out of Colchester borough. But

they haven't been satisfied with what we've offered them. We have

offered them more decent accommodation than they are

currently living in. But the Pryke's say the accommodation

offered wasn't suitable and it was too far from where their children

now go to school. I've been involved in this case for the last

six months. I've seen all the documentary evidence of what the

council has done ever since this issue arose and I don't think we

stepped out of line at all, we've played it exactly by the book.

We've given Mr and Mrs Pryke a lot of support, advice and guidance

which they haven't chosen to take. Therefore it's come to this. I'm

afraid they've brought a lot of this on themselves. Gwen's off to

Chelmsford Prison to see her husband, it'll be the first time

she'll have seen Asa since he started his sentence. It's surreal

really, obviously I'm very sorry for people who are in prison, but I

don't really feel he belongs there. But obviously I'll be pleased to

see him, although it's going to be very sad. This is a planning

dispute, but they're not in prison because of the planning dispute.

They're in prison because they're in contempt of court. It wasn't

Colchester borough council who sent them to prison it was a judge and

he knows the law and that's why Mr Pryke is currently in Chelmsford

prison. How did that go, what was it like? It was pretty horrible, it

was obviously good to see my husband, but he's not very well,

he's got pretty bad toothache. It's very bureaucratic. I mean don't get

me wrong, they're very professional, but it was, you know. I can't

believe I've had to go through such an experience really. How does it

make you feel that the same fate awaits you? I really don't relish

it, but at the same time I would never shrink from it. Back in

Dedham, Gwen has got used to her new lifestyle. When it's clear, we

get a wonderful view of the stars. We hear the owls and we hear things

rustling around, but we don't feel it's hostile. I think some people

would be rather scared living here but we've never been scared living

here. Although Asa's locked up in prison, Gwen's not alone here. The

couple's three teenage boys share two of the caravan's on site.

parents, I'm hoping they'll keep on going. I mean, I don't want to move

off here. God no, I don't want to see mum go to prison over this.

Your dad's in prison, how do you feel about that? It's ridiculous

for what he's been thrown in for. To be honest, the amount of money

that's been thrown at this thing, it's waste of money. He hasn't

really done anything wrong. It was a minor thing. It was a breach of

court order, but it was for a minor thing, he was just trying to keep

his family homed rather than being homeless. Do you blame your

parent's for the situation you find yourself in? No, definitely not. I

think in life you have to have these things. It either hits you

really late or hits you early, unfortunately for us it hurt us

really early. Our parents have been through a difficult time. Everyone

has their bad luck but we'll come out stronger from this. Although

the children now have to cope with one parent in prison, Gwen has no

doubts about what they are doing. feel we are doing the right thing.

This is the best thing that we can come up with at the moment for our

children. They're in full-time education, they're doing exams. I

get can them to school and my son can get to college. They are happy

and settled here. The council say because the Prykes are now bankrupt

they no longer own the land. It's a claim the family strongly dispute.

And they're adamant they'll continue to seek planning

permission to build a permanent home here. I think there's a very

real possibility that we will succeed, this land is brown field

and despite what people are trying to prove I do own this land. We've

proved it's not their land. And so we have to obey the rule of law.

That's what the council is here to do and therefore they're going to

have to move and we hope we can work with them to achieve that.

council say they now plan to take eviction proceedings against the

family. Meanwhile two months after entering prison, Asa has been

released early, having served half of his four month term. Well,

obviously today is a good day. It's a rather hackneyed phrase, but it's

rather like waking up from a dream. It's as if he's never really been

gone really. It's a bit like waking up from a bad dream. Are you

prepared to go back to prison? absolutely, I would be, but we have

to see this through, we have to bring some form of resolution. We

believe we have a case still, but the authorities, I believe, have

other ideas. Although Gwen has been regularly visiting Asa in prison,

it has been many weeks since the children last saw their dad. Last

week, police officers arrested Gwen Pryke. She's now in prison for

contempt of court. But her husband says they'll continue to fight to

And if there's anything you think we should look at you can e-mail us.

You were watching Inside out east. Still to come: volunteers helping

archaeologists rethink how people lived before Stonehenge was built.

We have been pulling things out of the ground, archaeology is not

They come hoping for a better life but the only one may find is one of

misery and exploitation. We have come to the East to report on sex

trafficking. And also on the people trying to help the sufferers escape.

Human trafficking is global crime and it's happening right here in

the UK. Its victims walk among us, but are living in the shadows of

our communities. Trapped and in fear of their lives. We are

investigating how traffickers exploit the most vulnerable people

in society. A trade in human misery that's fuelled by poverty and greed.

Our journey will take us to meet the traffickers. And we'll be

looking at how victims for all over the world are being brought into

the South East to work as slaves. This is a safe house. The girls who

live here have been trafficked into the country to be sexually

exploited. It's flavia's home for now. An orphan from Uganda, she

fled her home country desperate to escape from her uncle who sexually

abused her. I came just to save my life cos it was in danger, I went

to my aunt, a friend of my mum, she is the one who looked for those

guys. We have different agencies in Uganda they help people to travel

in different countries, the only thing I wanted is to be OK, to be

safe, so when I got there to the airport the guy told me, "I am

Moses, I will take you through. her situation was about to become

even worse. When she got here she was taken to a house and forced to

become a prostitute. When I got there, there were different girls,

but it was very hard to talk to them, and even women. When I got

there it was very big house, in fact like this one. When I got

there, they welcomed me, I thought everything was OK, not knowing they

We have one and moved around the South of thing -- of England, the

passports are taken for security. The answer adverts, they are

looking for new girls, but it is not new girls, there at the same

girls being moved around the region. Once you are in the hands of

traffickers it can be a difficult cycle to break. Children are being

born into slavery in the UK. In this safe house many women have had

babies as a result of rape. interesting feature of trafficked

women in the sex trade is that, as I say, they have very little

freedom, very little agency in what they do, no choice. So very often

trafficked women are asked to do things that UK sex workers

voluntarily would not do, so they fill some rather unpleasant,

unsavoury gaps in the market, if you want to term it that, for men.

So trafficked women are often required, they have no say in the

matter, to provide unprotected sex, or violent sex. But despite the

fact this is happening in the UK, some experts say we are only just

starting to realise the extent of the problem. There are no

Government targets for this and in fact what we are doing by

unearthing human trafficking offences is actually increasing

recorded crime. But is the key to dealing with the problem to take

inspiration from further afield? This is Romania. It's been

identified by intelligence experts as posing one of the greatest

threats to the UK when it comes to trafficking. But it's also a

country that some say is ahead of the game in recognizing it has a

problem and dealing with it with tougher maximum sentences and a

dedicated law. Vladmimir Hitel sold girls to the UK and Europe. But why

did he start trafficking? Money. Money. TRANSLATION: They came from

abroad, Germany, Spain, England. People with money, they looked for

beautiful girls and where are the beautiful girls? Romania. Do you

ever think about what happened to these women? I knew very well how

things were because their women, the English girls, couldn't do this

stuff because they'd put them in prison straight away. So they took

slaves from Romania and nobody could do anything to them. They can

even kill them, nobody knows a thing because they are bought,

taken illegally, nobody knows a thing. Romania has been cracking

down on traffickers with one of the highest conviction rates in Europe.

And campaigners like Mike Emberson from the Medaille trust think we

could learn a lot from their approach. I'd want to know why have

we only got eight convictions a year in the UK and over here they

are averaging well over 200 a year? And is that because there is more

trafficking? I don't think it is. I think it is to do with legislation

to be honest. And how would you like to see our legislation

improved? I think a single consolidated act, well thought out,

well drafted, would help our prosecutors a lot more than the

current hodge podge. Police in the UK say they are taking tough action

against organized criminals with a number of successful raids.

Superintendent David Miller says we could be getting more convictions

for human trafficking than we think. The convictions that will be sought

are the ones that will provide the best evidence to convict the right

people, so that may be a rape, or a sexual offence. It may be

procurement of women it may be a trafficking offence, or it maybe

fraud, forgery or theft, false imprisonment. Some of those

offences fall naturally under the human trafficking umbrella. So you

can be convicted of rape and not convicted of trafficking.

despite what they have been through, it's unlikely that many of the

women here will ever see justice and Mike Emberson says the UK needs

to do more to make sure it's not seen as a soft touch by traffickers.

Greed, that's what's fuelling this, the greed of some evil criminals.

While it's interesting to think about trafficking as just something

that happens in far away places like Romania, it's happening in the

South East, in ordinary houses and streets, it could even be happening

At discovery that started with a photograph in Cambridge and led to

a revelation in a wood near Stonehenge. Experts are excited and

volunteers from across the East have been helping out. We were on

I've come to wintry Cambridge world famous centre of learning. Now

researchers from here have made enormous contributions to many

disciplines, not least Archaeology. It was a photo in the archive here

that has led to a discovery in one of the best researched places in

the world - Stonehenge. It was found by Cambridge archaeologist

David Jacques who has brought a small sample of his finds for me to

see. So what is it that attracted you to the site? I was in Cambridge

University Museum and happened across this picture of a crop mark.

It looked like something interesting. I checked it out and

realised it had been missed by other people. On the shortest day

of the year we joined the winter solstices celebrations at

Stonehenge when all sorts come to practise their own version of

The site David has discovered could change our understanding of the

origins of the stones. He showed me how he found it. In this landscape

you can see why Archaeologists have honed in on the monument as there's

so much to look at and explore. What my team did was to look at

natural places. So...where would you imagine animals would have gone

to have a drink? My thinking was, where you find animals you find

people, certainly hunter-gatherer groups coming after them. What we

found essentially is the nearest secure watering hole for animals

and people, on top of an all-year- round fresh water source and it's

the nearest one to this place. And David's dig is hidden away in a

private woodland where once the wild animals came to drink. It was

here that the stone-age hunter gatherer's killed and butchered

them. The vast amount of material being uncovered suggests this

activity lasted possibly thousands In the pool by the spring they have

discovered more stone tools than could have been imagined. To the

experienced eye, the smallest flint is revealed as a razor sharp blade.

David's got a great bunch of people here with him. He's got

professional archaeologists and academics popping in to lend a hand,

but also volunteers - people from nearby Amesbury and those who have

travelled miles to be here. thing they've all got in common is

incredible enthusiasm for what is going on and discovering its great

stuff. And they're all really into it. You squeeze the clay, feel

something sharp. Oh, a flint! Oh, a flint! It's every couple of minutes.

This is one of my favourites from today, Tom just passed this to me

straight up out of the trench. you hold that in your right hand,

with your thumb and middle finger there, and index finger there. Hold

It strikes me that in your bucket you have more flint than soil.

Volunteers have come from as far afield as Lowestoft in Suffolk, but

most are from the local town of Amesbury. There is never a shortage

of willing workers. What keeps bringing you back?

I think really keeps pestering us to come back, we keep finding stuff,

we keep pulling stuff out of ground. It's like Top trumps of or

archaeology. For me as third generation born and bred in

Amesbury, this is the something that puts Amesbury on the map.

local centre of operations is in a hall which Amesbury hopes will

become their museum to rival Stonehenge. This would have been an

Inland an island, surrounded by water. Right from the off, the

first talk in town had handful of people. Then 120 people at the talk,

extra chairs, people coming in and standing at the back. When I think

what they've done. It's an amazing amount of thinking on site and

Back in Cambridge David's discovery is causing much excitement. How

important is it all to Wolfson to support David's work? To find

something of this significance is very exciting. Great for us. You

make the students and come back here and talk to us, we get a sense

here of the excitement that is being generated. It used to be the

province of the gentleman caller, archaeology. On out there is so

many scientific aspects. It is still a very important role for the

amateur. They help with pigs and all kinds of ways with the

As Winter Solstice celebrations began, David and his army gathered

at the Heel Stone. Hi, David, how's it going? Oh, ever so well thanks.

Isn't this absolutely brilliant? Four more coaches due. Got your

lantern? It's been thrust into my hand, I'm all lantern-ed up. It's a

privilege to be here for everybody. One member of the team has come

down from Essex. We have some from Milton Keynes and also local in

spree people. -- Amesbury. start here at sunset then you

process. We're following the pre- historic landscape route way it's

fantastic. I've roped in the family, sister-in-law brother-in-law, the

whole shooting caboodle for a big walk and they're all very excited.

So here we are just about coming up to mid-winter. Sunset is

tremendously important. It is why we think Stonehenge was built,

these alignments following along at the solstice. There are

celebrations around that. But this evening this is all about the local

community and their response to the stones. They've started a new

tradition. I am quite excited to see how it all pans out. First,

three cheers for the ancestors who built that lovely place. Hip-hip-

hooray! Hip-hip-hooray! Hip-hip- I think for me the really important

thing is that archaeology often doesn't involve people properly.

I'd never have imagined something so amazing as today proper local

ownership of their archaeology. Whether it's people who happen to

be dead for 8,000 years and their artefacts or now. In a weird way

that's what today has been about, What an incredible story. That is

it from Cambridge. You can e-mail us with anything you think we

should be doing a story on. Or you can get me on Twitter. 24 the last

in the series next week. I will be back with these stories.

We find out what happened to the Essex residents campaigning to save