Sleazy landlord sentenced to 13 years in prison

A rogue landlord who forced susceptible women into prostitution and sexually assaulted others while ruling his £16m property empire has been sentenced to 13 years in prison. 

David Archer, 53, earned in the region of £1.6m a year from his property portfolio, centred in and near London, but unfortunately most of this money came from being a pimp. 

Archer, who had links to organised crime in Romania, Brazil and Ireland, trafficked vulnerable foreign women into the UK and forced them to work in the sex industry.

A six-month investigation revealed that Archer’s property portfolio included a three-bedroom house which he had illegally converted into 24 bedrooms – each used to sell sex.

He was sent to jail after admitting conspiracy to control prostitution for gain, two counts of human trafficking, possession of a fake ID document and concealing criminal property.

He was also found guilty of three counts of sexual assault following a four-week trial at Snaresbrook Crown Court but cleared of seven rapes and another assault.

According to the Sunday Mail, Archer, who actually changed his name from David Grant, was a landlord who fled Glasgow with a £500,000 trail of debt, after stealing deposits from students that occupied his rental properties. 

In 2007, he pleaded guilty to allowing a dangerous building in Dublin to be used as a hostel for 170 people without planning consent or a fire certificate.

Archer was exposed in a recent BBC show, The Met: Policing London, in which Sergeant Vicky Kneale branded him “very controlling, very manipulative” with brothels in London and “potentially overseas”.

When she discovered the £142,000 of cash in his bedroom, she said: “Holy s**t. We’ve just found a whole load of money in Archer’s room. I had no idea it was going to be on this scale.”

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