Students wear thick denim to nightclubs to stop being spiked with needles

A woman shared a worrying message she recived from her daughter about sexual harassment and spiking in clubs (Picture: @lucymirandaward)

Young women are going to clubs wearing denim jackets and other thick clothing to protect themselves from attackers armed with syringes, it has been claimed.

Students across the country are boycotting nightclubs over a rise in women apparently being spiked with needles.

Yesterday a man was arrested after a string of incidents reported in Nottingham, Edinburgh, Stirling, Dundee and Glasgow.

Following the news, writer Lucy Ward texted her daughter, a first year university student, to see if she had heard of the ‘horrific new variant’ of drink spiking.

In a reply Lucy shared on Twitter, her daughter said she knew by name ‘about half a dozen girls who have been spiked, and others who suspect they have’.

She said that she had been ‘endlessly groped and shouted at in the street’ and that entering a club ‘basically guarantees a hand up your skirt, with some guys even yanking your hair’.

She said many of her friends had also experienced sexual harassment, including one who yesterday had an official meeting to report a third year student who was following her.

In another shocking example, she said one man bought her friend a drink but refused to give it to her unless she gave him a kiss.

The epidemic of drinks spiking targeting young women – students and not – in nightclubs has a horrific new variant: injecting women in the back or leg with the same drugs. I asked my daughter – first year at a UK uni – if she had heard of it and she sent me this: pic.twitter.com/bWJmYRXfXi

— Lucy Ward (@lucymirandaward) October 19, 2021

‘When she said no he poured it all over her,’ she told her mum.

Lucy’s daughter added: ‘I have left clubs early, in tears, having been grabbed or having had horrible threats or comments shouted into my ears.

‘Literally later today my flat mate is having an official meeting to report how she was followed by one third year guy and Facebook groups and forums all include loads of reports of similar.

‘Girls desperately warning each other to avoid this man, that man. All with little more description to go on than the jacket he wore, the colour of his hair, the horrible words he used.’

On drink spiking, she claimed injections ‘is the most recent thing they’re doing now and people are more scared than ever’.

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Have you been affected by the issues raised in this piece? Email faye.brown@metro.co.uk

She added: ‘The scariest thing to me is how unsurprised we all are.

‘We go out in groups, we refuse drinks, we keep our phones on and in our hands. Girls are wearing denim jackets, because the material is harder to pierce.

‘We simply accept the latest horror and come up with ways to protect ourselves, and of course remain weak and vulnerable anyway.’

Lucy did not reveal what university her daughter is at.

It comes as students up and down the country plan boycotts of popular nightclubs to put pressure on the venues to combat drink spiking.

The ‘@girlsnightin’ protests are happening in Leeds, Swansea, Edinburgh, Aberdeen, Bristol, Nottingham and Durham, to name a few.

Meanwhile, a petition to make it a legal requirement for nightclubs to ‘thoroughly search guests on entry’ has now gained over 110,000 signatures.

Zara Owen, 19, believes she was spiked with a needle (Picture: Nottingham Post / BPM Media)

Nottinghamshire Police confirmed yesterday that they are investigating reports of drink spiking and that ‘linked to this a small number of victims have said that they may have felt a scratching sensation as if someone may have spiked them physically’.

Other women have posted unconfirmed reports on social media that they were spiked by needles during nights out in cities, including Dundee, Edinburgh and Stirling.

Police Scotland said its inquiries were at an early stage, but that it was also investigating reports of women being spiked by injection.

Zara Owen, 19, a languages student at Nottingham University, came forward to say she was spiked while out at the

Pryzm nightclub on October 11. She told the BBC she blacked out after entering the venue and woke up the next day with a limp and a pinprick on her leg.

Meanwhile Ellie Simpson said her sister, who does not want to be named, also believes she was injected with a mystery liquid during a night out in Nottingham.

She said the 19-year-old – a student from Derby – felt a ‘pinch on the back of her arm’ as she left Stealth nightclub on October 12.

Nottinghamshire police said a 20-year-old man had been arrested on suspicion of possession of class A and class B and cause [to] administer poison or noxious thing with intent to injure, aggrieve and annoy’ following an incident in Lower Parliament Street on 16 October.

The man has now been released on bail.

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