‘Serf’ tells court: I had nowhere else to go

By ROD MINCHIN
Published on 22/09/2012 01:40

A MAN forced to work as a “serf” for a traveller family stayed with them for 18 years because he had nowhere else to go, a court heard.

Alexander Gourlay, 54, said that, had he stopped working for the Connors family, he would have ended up sleeping on a park bench or staying at a homeless shelter.

The Birmingham-born witness told Bristol Crown Court that he had been picked up from a shelter in the city and worked long hours for the family, surfacing drives or laying paving slabs, for as little as £10 a day.

William Connors, 52, his wife, Mary, 48, their sons, John, 29, and James, 20, and son-in-law Miles Connors, 23, deny charges of conspiracy to hold another person in servitude.

“I wanted to leave, but I had no place to stay. I would have to stay on a park bench or another hostel,” Mr Gourlay said.