Monica Coghlan
Monica Coghlan (3 April
Early life
Monica Mary Coghlan was born on 3 April 1951, in Rochdale, the sixth of seven children. She had a troubled childhood, leaving home and school at the age of 15. While living alone, the diminutive (1.50 m, 4' 11", as an adult) teenager suffered a violent sexual attack and was forced to leave her flat. She first worked as a cloakroom attendant at a local cabaret, then became a prostitute at the age of 17. Her work alias was 'Debbie'. She was arrested several times for soliciting in the Greater Manchester area, and moved to London. Other juvenile arrests led to convictions for cannabis possession and shoplifting. She served two prison terms. All the time she concealed what she did from her family, telling them she worked in property.[2][3]
She became pregnant, and for a short time retired from prostitution, returning to live in Rochdale to raise her son, Robin Daley Coghlan (born 1984, Rochdale).[1] When her boyfriend died unexpectedly, she returned to prostitution, leading a double life "to secure the boy's future"; she cared for the toddler during the week, then left him with friends or relatives at weekends, to commute by train to London to work.[3]
Jeffrey Archer
In September 1986 Coghlan picked up a client in
During the trial, Coghlan broke down in tears repeatedly on cross-examination, but continued to assert the truth of the newspaper's story, dramatically calling Archer a liar in court. In other testimony she stated that she enjoyed her job as a prostitute, and defended her work with married clients, saying that "Half the time it keeps marriages together." She regretted that she could not go back to work after the trial. "Jeffrey Archer took everything away from me," she would later say. "I lost my home, my dignity, my self-respect, and any hope of a future."[3][7]
After the trial
After the trial, Coghlan posed topless for a newspaper for £5,400, then worked as a
On 26 April 2001, drug addict Gary Day crashed a stolen Jaguar S-Type into Coghlan's Ford Fiesta outside Huddersfield, West Yorkshire. Day, 32, had robbed a pharmacy for drugs, then hijacked two cars using a fake pistol: first a Peugeot taxi, which he crashed into a parked Land Rover, then the Jaguar from a motorist who had stopped at the first crash scene to help. Coghlan's car was catapulted through a wall. She lay in the wreck for an hour, and had to be cut out of the wreckage through the car roof. She died from her injuries the next day in a hospital in Leeds, aged 50. Day admitted manslaughter, and was sentenced to life imprisonment on 6 July 2001.[3][8]
Following her death and Archer's conviction for perjury, on 20 July 2001 the English Collective of Prostitutes wrote an open letter to The Guardian newspaper supporting her vindication, and calling her unjustly "branded by her sex, race and class and by the prostitution laws which label and condemn women."[9]
References
- ^ a b "Trace your Family Tree Online - Genealogy & Ancestry from Findmypast - findmypast.com". www.findmypast.com.
- ^ a b c "Victim: Monica Coghlan", 20 July 2001, The Guardian
- ^ a b c d e f "The Press, the Hooker, the Peer and His Fragrant Wife" Archived 25 August 2006 at the Wayback Machine, by Michael Yockel, New York Press, 16 April 2001
- ^ Indian who felled Archer squabbles for art
- ^ Paul Robertshaw, Summary Justice, A&C Black, 1998, pp.44.ff
- ^ "Hindustan Times - Archive News". www.hindustantimes.com. Archived from the original on 16 December 2014.
- ISBN 978-1-85227-094-0.
- ^ "Coghlan killer is jailed for life" by Martin Wainwright, 7 July 2001, The Guardian
- ^ English Collective of Prostitutes letter, All Women Count Archived 13 March 2007 at the Wayback Machine Global Women's Strike Archived 2 September 2006 at the Wayback Machine