This is an Official Statistics bulletin produced by statisticians in the Ministry of Justice, Home Office and the Office for National Statistics. It brings together, for the first time, a range of official statistics from across the crime and criminal justice system, providing an overview of sexual offending in England and Wales. The report is structured to highlight: the victim experience; the police role in recording and detecting the crimes; how the various criminal justice agencies deal with an offender once identified; and the criminal histories of sex offenders.
Providing such an overview presents a number of challenges, not least that the available information comes from different sources that do not necessarily cover the same period, the same people (victims or offenders) or the same offences. This is explained further in the report.
Based on aggregated data from the ‘Crime Survey for England and Wales’ in 2009/10, 2010/11 and 2011/12, on average, 2.5 per cent of females and 0.4 per cent of males said that they had been a victim of a sexual offence (including attempts) in the previous 12 months. This represents around 473,000 adults being victims of sexual offences (around 404,000 females and 72,000 males) on average per year. These experiences span the full spectrum of sexual offences, ranging from the most serious offences of rape and sexual assault, to other sexual offences like indecent exposure and unwanted touching. The vast majority of incidents reported by respondents to the survey fell into the other sexual offences category.
It is estimated that 0.5 per cent of females report being a victim of the most serious offences of rape or sexual assault by penetration in the previous 12 months, equivalent to around 85,000 victims on average per year. Among males, less than 0.1 per cent (around 12,000) report being a victim of the same types of offences in the previous 12 months.
Around one in twenty females (aged 16 to 59) reported being a victim of a most serious sexual offence since the age of 16. Extending this to include other sexual offences such as sexual threats, unwanted touching or indecent exposure, this increased to one in five females reporting being a victim since the age of 16.
Around 90 per cent of victims of the most serious sexual offences in the previous year knew the perpetrator, compared with less than half for other sexual offences.
Females who had reported being victims of the most serious sexual offences in the last year were asked, regarding the most recent incident, whether or not they had reported the incident to the police. Only 15 per cent of victims of such offences said that they had done so. Frequently cited reasons for not reporting the crime were that it was ‘embarrassing’, they ‘didn’t think the police could do much to help’, that the incident was ‘too trivial or not worth reporting’, or that they saw it as a ‘private/family matter and not police business’
In 2011/12, the police recorded a total of 53,700 sexual offences across England and Wales. The most serious sexual offences of ‘rape’ (16,000 offences) and ‘sexual assault’ (22,100 offences) accounted for 71 per cent of sexual offences recorded by the police. This differs markedly from victims responding to the CSEW in 2011/12, the majority of whom were reporting being victims of other sexual offences outside the most serious category.
This reflects the fact that victims are more likely to report the most serious sexual offences to the police and, as such, the police and broader criminal justice system (CJS) tend to deal largely with the most serious end of the spectrum of sexual offending. The majority of the other sexual crimes recorded by the police related to ‘exposure or voyeurism’ (7,000) and ‘sexual activity with minors’ (5,800).
Trends in recorded crime statistics can be influenced by whether victims feel able to and decide to report such offences to the police, and by changes in police recording practices. For example, while there was a 17 per cent decrease in recorded sexual offences between 2005/06 and 2008/09, there was a seven per cent increase between 2008/09 and 2010/11. The latter increase may in part be due to greater encouragement by the police to victims to come forward and improvements in police recording, rather than an increase in the level of victimisation.
After the initial recording of a crime, the police may later decide that no crime took place as more details about the case emerge. In 2011/12, there were 4,155 offences initially recorded as sexual offences that the police later decided were not crimes. There are strict guidelines that set out circumstances under which a crime report may be ‘no crimed’. The ‘no-crime’ rate for sexual offences (7.2 per cent) compare
These data are part of NACJD's Fast Track Release and are distributed as they were received from the data depositor. The files have been zipped by NACJD for release, but not checked or processed except for the removal of direct identifiers. Users should refer to the accompanying readme file for a brief description of the files available with this collection and consult the investigator(s) if further information is needed. Serial sexual assault is a pervasive problem: court record recidivism rates show that 10-15% of convicted sex offenders re-assault within five years and self-report studies suggest that 63-78% of males who have committed sexual assaults have raped more than one individual. The current study documents the scope of repeat sexual offending through a previously-unexplored method of documenting serial perpetration: DNA evidence in sexual assault kits (SAKs). Ultimately, the testing of N = 7,287 previously untested SAKs revealed n = 1,270 unique and identifiable perpetrators. When combined with information from lifetime criminal history records, 39.7% (n = 504) of this subsample of unique and identifiable perpetrators were found to be serial sexual offenders who committed, on average, 3.27 sexual assaults. This collection contains 10 SPSS files: ESCALATIONdata_2018-05-15.sav (1142 cases, 6 variables) Forensic_Outcomes_2018-04-03.sav (7287 cases, 7 variables) PERPdata_2018-04-03.sav (1424 cases, 12 variables) SAKdata_2018-04-03.sav (1675 cases, 6 variables) SAK_PERP_2018-04-03.sav (1691 cases, 12 variables) SSA_ARR_Arrests_Imputed_2018-09-03.sav (9826 cases, 24 variables) SSA_CHG_PA_Charges_Imputed_2018-09-03.sav (6052 cases, 24 variables) SSA_IDN_Offenders_2018-09-03.sav (1142 cases, 17 variables) SSA_INC_Incidents_Imputed_2018-09-03.sav (9550 cases, 16 variables) SSA_JUD_Judicial_Charges_Imputed_2018-09-03.sav (12522 cases, 30 variables) This collection includes demographic variables on offenders, including sex, race, age, and arrest region.
This statistic shows the number of registered sex offenders in the U.S. in 2011 by state. ***** sex offenders were registered in the state of Maine.
https://www.icpsr.umich.edu/web/ICPSR/studies/36593/termshttps://www.icpsr.umich.edu/web/ICPSR/studies/36593/terms
These data are part of NACJD's Fast Track Release and are distributed as they were received from the data depositor. The files have been zipped by NACJD for release, but not checked or processed except for the removal of direct identifiers. Users should refer to the accompanying readme file for a brief description of the files available with this collection and consult the investigator(s) if further information is needed. This study examined the extent to which contextual factors influenced variation in sex offender sentencing decisions. By law, Pennsylvania trial courts were required to submit all felony and misdemeanor convictions under the Pennsylvania Sentencing Guidelines to the Pennsylvania Commission on Sentencing on a yearly basis. These data were supplemented with county-level data from the American Community Survey, Administrative Office of Pennsylvania Courts' Annual Caseload Statistics of the Unified Judicial System of Pennsylvania, Associated Religion Data Archives, and Pennsylvania Department of State, Voter Registration Statistics Archives. The collection contains 1 SPSS data file (Cleaned-Data-2015-R2-CX-0039.sav (n=318048; 31 variables)). Demographic variables include gender, race, and defendant's age at sentencing.
In 2022, about 194,164 perpetrators of child abuse in the United States were white. In that same year, about 83,314 perpetrators of child abuse were Hispanic, and 25,092 were of unknown ethnic origin.
In the 2023/24 reporting year there were 3.1 sexual offences per 1,000 population in England and Wales, with Cleveland police force reporting the highest rate of 4.4 sexual crimes per 1,000 people.
In the year ended June 2019, European offenders accounted for 43.8 percent of the offenders of sexual assault crime in New Zealand. The number of victim-reported crimes has trended slightly upwards the past few years, with the Canterbury and Counties/Manukau regions reporting the highest number of offences across the country.
This dataset contains aggregate data on violent index victimizations at the quarter level of each year (i.e., January – March, April – June, July – September, October – December), from 2001 to the present (1991 to present for Homicides), with a focus on those related to gun violence. Index crimes are 10 crime types selected by the FBI (codes 1-4) for special focus due to their seriousness and frequency. This dataset includes only those index crimes that involve bodily harm or the threat of bodily harm and are reported to the Chicago Police Department (CPD). Each row is aggregated up to victimization type, age group, sex, race, and whether the victimization was domestic-related. Aggregating at the quarter level provides large enough blocks of incidents to protect anonymity while allowing the end user to observe inter-year and intra-year variation. Any row where there were fewer than three incidents during a given quarter has been deleted to help prevent re-identification of victims. For example, if there were three domestic criminal sexual assaults during January to March 2020, all victims associated with those incidents have been removed from this dataset. Human trafficking victimizations have been aggregated separately due to the extremely small number of victimizations.
This dataset includes a " GUNSHOT_INJURY_I " column to indicate whether the victimization involved a shooting, showing either Yes ("Y"), No ("N"), or Unknown ("UKNOWN.") For homicides, injury descriptions are available dating back to 1991, so the "shooting" column will read either "Y" or "N" to indicate whether the homicide was a fatal shooting or not. For non-fatal shootings, data is only available as of 2010. As a result, for any non-fatal shootings that occurred from 2010 to the present, the shooting column will read as “Y.” Non-fatal shooting victims will not be included in this dataset prior to 2010; they will be included in the authorized dataset, but with "UNKNOWN" in the shooting column.
The dataset is refreshed daily, but excludes the most recent complete day to allow CPD time to gather the best available information. Each time the dataset is refreshed, records can change as CPD learns more about each victimization, especially those victimizations that are most recent. The data on the Mayor's Office Violence Reduction Dashboard is updated daily with an approximately 48-hour lag. As cases are passed from the initial reporting officer to the investigating detectives, some recorded data about incidents and victimizations may change once additional information arises. Regularly updated datasets on the City's public portal may change to reflect new or corrected information.
How does this dataset classify victims?
The methodology by which this dataset classifies victims of violent crime differs by victimization type:
Homicide and non-fatal shooting victims: A victimization is considered a homicide victimization or non-fatal shooting victimization depending on its presence in CPD's homicide victims data table or its shooting victims data table. A victimization is considered a homicide only if it is present in CPD's homicide data table, while a victimization is considered a non-fatal shooting only if it is present in CPD's shooting data tables and absent from CPD's homicide data table.
To determine the IUCR code of homicide and non-fatal shooting victimizations, we defer to the incident IUCR code available in CPD's Crimes, 2001-present dataset (available on the City's open data portal). If the IUCR code in CPD's Crimes dataset is inconsistent with the homicide/non-fatal shooting categorization, we defer to CPD's Victims dataset.
For a criminal homicide, the only sensible IUCR codes are 0110 (first-degree murder) or 0130 (second-degree murder). For a non-fatal shooting, a sensible IUCR code must signify a criminal sexual assault, a robbery, or, most commonly, an aggravated battery. In rare instances, the IUCR code in CPD's Crimes and Victims dataset do not align with the homicide/non-fatal shooting categorization:
Other violent crime victims: For other violent crime types, we refer to the IUCR classification that exists in CPD's victim table, with only one exception:
Note: All businesses identified as victims in CPD data have been removed from this dataset.
Note: The definition of “homicide” (shooting or otherwise) does not include justifiable homicide or involuntary manslaughter. This dataset also excludes any cases that CPD considers to be “unfounded” or “noncriminal.”
Note: In some instances, the police department's raw incident-level data and victim-level data that were inputs into this dataset do not align on the type of crime that occurred. In those instances, this dataset attempts to correct mismatches between incident and victim specific crime types. When it is not possible to determine which victims are associated with the most recent crime determination, the dataset will show empty cells in the respective demographic fields (age, sex, race, etc.).
Note: The initial reporting officer usually asks victims to report demographic data. If victims are unable to recall, the reporting officer will use their best judgment. “Unknown” can be reported if it is truly unknown.
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Sexual offence numbers, prevalence and victim characteristics, including breakdowns by type of incident, sex, victim-perpetrator relationship and location based upon findings from the Crime Survey for England and Wales and police recorded crime.
These data assess the effects of the risk of local jail incarceration and of police aggressiveness in patrol style on rates of violent offending. The collection includes arrest rates for public order offenses, size of county jail populations, and numbers of new prison admissions as they relate to arrest rates for index (serious) crimes. Data were collected from seven sources for each city. CENSUS OF POPULATION AND HOUSING, 1980 [UNITED STATES]: SUMMARY TAPE FILE 1A (ICPSR 7941), provided county-level data on number of persons by race, age, and age by race, number of persons in households, and types of households within each county. CENSUS OF POPULATION AND HOUSING, 1980 [UNITED STATES]: SUMMARY TAPE FILE 3A (ICPSR 8071), measured at the city level, provided data on total population, race, age, marital status by sex, persons in household, number of households, housing, children, and families above and below the poverty level by race, employment by race, and income by race within each city. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) 1980 data provided variables on total offenses and offense rates per 100,000 persons for homicides, rapes, robbery, aggravated assault, burglary, larceny, motor vehicle offenses, and arson. Data from the FBI for 1980-1982, averaged per 100,000, provided variables for the above offenses by sex, age, and race, and the Uniform Crime Report arrest rates for index crimes within each city. The NATIONAL JAIL CENSUS for 1978 and 1983 (ICPSR 7737 and ICPSR 8203), aggregated to the county level, provided variables on jail capacity, number of inmates being held by sex, race, and status of inmate's case (awaiting trial, awaiting sentence, serving sentence, and technical violations), average daily jail populations, number of staff by full-time and part-time, number of volunteers, and number of correctional officers. The JUVENILE DETENTION AND CORRECTIONAL FACILITY CENSUS for 1979 and 1982-1983 (ICPSR 7846 and 8205), aggregated to the county level, provided data on the number of individuals being held by type of crime and sex, as well as age of juvenile offenders by sex, average daily prison population, and payroll and other expenditures for the institutions.
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This study compares the characteristics, sentence/offence information, and criminogenic risk and need profile of gender diverse offenders with sex offence histories to offenders in men’s and women’s institutions with similar offence histories.
By the summer of 1998, the Vermont Department of Corrections (DOC) had completed three years of operational experience with "restorative justice," a concept that involves compensating victims and establishing community-based reparative boards that determine how offenders can make amends for their crimes. The purpose of this project was to update the benchmark findings from an earlier survey of Vermont residents in 1994, to assess public attitudes about the reforms and changes that had been instituted by the Vermont DOC, and to explore the possibility of expansion of responsibilities of the reparative community boards. This project involved a telephone survey of a new sample of 601 adult residents of Vermont. The interviewing was conducted on March 15-21, 1999. Respondents were asked a series of trend questions to update the 1994 findings. Respondents were also asked questions about two other programs: the diversion program, in which selected first offenders who fulfilled the terms of a community-based sanction could have their records expunged, and the furlough program, in which offenders making the transition from prison to the community were supervised for an interim period. The survey also explored whether Vermonters would like to see the responsibilities of the reparative boards expanded to include community notification and other types of cases. Residents assessed whether crime in general, violent crime, and illegal drug use had increased compared to five years prior, whether more prisons should be built, whether Vermont's jails and prisons were overcrowded, and whether violent offenders were being released before completing their sentences because of overcrowding. They commented on how often offenders in four scenarios should go to prison and how often they believed that these offenders in fact did go to prison. Respondents rated the performance of various segments of the Vermont criminal justice system and, given 15 offense scenarios, were asked whether the offender should spend time in jail or in community service and rehabilitation. In addition, respondents were asked whether anyone in their household had been a victim of a crime within the last three years and, if so, whether it was a violent crime. Demographic data include sex, employment, education, race/ethnicity, and age category of the respondent, and the county and region where the resident lived.
The number of reported sexual offences in Denmark increased significantly since 2015. That year, less than 3,000 sexual offences were reported, a number that had increased to over 9,500 as of 2022. A vast majority of the victims are women. In December 2020, the Danish parliament passed a law based on sexual consent, following the example of the neighboring country Sweden.
Victims of criminal offences In 2021, the number of reported victims of crime in Denmark dropped below 60,000. The most common crime experienced by Danes was violent crimes. The number of male victims was higher than female victims.
Safe country In general, Denmark is considered a safe and peaceful country. In 2022, it ranked sixth in the ranking of the most peaceful countries in the world. Its Global Peace Index was 1.3. The following applies here: the lower the index value, the higher the peacefulness. This index measures the level of safety, the extent of current domestic and international conflicts, as well as the extent of militarization.
Open Government Licence 3.0http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/
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Alcohol-related sexual crimes: Persons, all ages (per 1,000 population)
*This indicator is discontinued
In 2023, the rate of forcible rapes in the United States stood at 38 per 100,000 inhabitants. As the FBI revised the definition of rape in 2013, the 2023 rate is a slight decrease from 1990, when there were 41.2 forcible rapes per 100,000 inhabitants. What is forcible rape? According to the FBI, forcible rape is defined as “sexual penetration, no matter how slight, with a body part or object without the consent of the victim.” This definition changed in 2013 from the previous definition, which specified “carnal knowledge of a female victim forcibly and against her will.” Attempted rape was included in the previous definition, but statutory rape and other sexual offenses were excluded. The old definition was seen as problematic, as people of any gender can be raped. Since the revision of the definition of rape, reported rapes increased, although it is not clear if this is due to the revised definition or if the rate itself has increased. Rape in the United States While rape and sexual assault have been extensively talked about in the U.S. in recent years, especially since the start of the #metoo movement, there is still a large number of sexual offences committed each year. Sadly, the majority of sex offences in the U.S. are carried out against individuals age 20 and under. Astoundingly, the Anchorage, Alaska metropolitan area had the highest rape rate in the United States in 2023, followed by St Joseph in Missouri and Kansas. Since rape and sexual assault continue to be underreported in the United States, it is important to find a solution to this devastating problem.
These data examine the relationships between childhood abuse and/or neglect and later criminal and violent criminal behavior. In particular, the data focus on whether being a victim of violence and/or neglect in early childhood leads to being a criminal offender in adolescence or early adulthood and whether a relationship exists between childhood abuse or neglect and arrests as a juvenile, arrests as an adult, and arrests for violent offenses. For this data collection, adult and juvenile criminal histories of sampled cases with backgrounds of abuse or neglect were compared to those of a matched control group with no official record of abuse or neglect. Variables contained in Part 1 include demographic information (age, race, sex, and date of birth). In Part 2, information is presented on the abuse/neglect incident (type of abuse or neglect, duration of the incident, whether the child was removed from the home and, if so, for how long, results of the placement, and whether the individual was still alive). Part 3 contains family information (with whom the child was living at the time of the incident, family disruptions, and who reported the abuse or neglect) and data on the perpetrator of the incident (relation to the victim, age, race, sex, and whether living in the home of the victim). Part 4 contains information on the charges filed within adult arrest incidents (occasion for arrest, multiple counts of the same type of charge, year and location of arrest, and type of offense or charge), and Part 5 includes information on the charges filed within juvenile arrest incidents (year of juvenile charge, number of arrests, and type of offense or charge). The unit of analysis for Parts 1 through 3 is the individual at age 11 or younger, for Part 4 the charge within the adult arrest incident, and for Part 5 the charge within the juvenile arrest incident.
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In 1980, the National Institute of Justice awarded a grant to the Cornell University College of Human Ecology for the establishment of the Center for the Study of Race, Crime, and Social Policy in Oakland, California. This center mounted a long-term research project that sought to explain the wide variation in crime statistics by race and ethnicity. Using information from eight ethnic communities in Oakland, California, representing working- and middle-class Black, White, Chinese, and Hispanic groups, as well as additional data from Oakland's justice systems and local organizations, the center conducted empirical research to describe the criminalization process and to explore the relationship between race and crime. The differences in observed patterns and levels of crime were analyzed in terms of: (1) the abilities of local ethnic communities to contribute to, resist, neutralize, or otherwise affect the criminalization of its members, (2) the impacts of criminal justice policies on ethnic communities and their members, and (3) the cumulative impacts of criminal justice agency decisions on the processing of individuals in the system. Administrative records data were gathered from two sources, the Alameda County Criminal Oriented Records Production System (CORPUS) (Part 1) and the Oakland District Attorney Legal Information System (DALITE) (Part 2). In addition to collecting administrative data, the researchers also surveyed residents (Part 3), police officers (Part 4), and public defenders and district attorneys (Part 5). The eight study areas included a middle- and low-income pair of census tracts for each of the four racial/ethnic groups: white, Black, Hispanic, and Asian. Part 1, Criminal Oriented Records Production System (CORPUS) Data, contains information on offenders' most serious felony and misdemeanor arrests, dispositions, offense codes, bail arrangements, fines, jail terms, and pleas for both current and prior arrests in Alameda County. Demographic variables include age, sex, race, and marital status. Variables in Part 2, District Attorney Legal Information System (DALITE) Data, include current and prior charges, days from offense to charge, disposition, and arrest, plea agreement conditions, final results from both municipal court and superior court, sentence outcomes, date and outcome of arraignment, disposition, and sentence, number and type of enhancements, numbers of convictions, mistrials, acquittals, insanity pleas, and dismissals, and factors that determined the prison term. For Part 3, Oakland Community Crime Survey Data, researchers interviewed 1,930 Oakland residents from eight communities. Information was gathered from community residents on the quality of schools, shopping, and transportation in their neighborhoods, the neighborhood's racial composition, neighborhood problems, such as noise, abandoned buildings, and drugs, level of crime in the neighborhood, chances of being victimized, how respondents would describe certain types of criminals in terms of age, race, education, and work history, community involvement, crime prevention measures, the performance of the police, judges, and attorneys, victimization experiences, and fear of certain types of crimes. Demographic variables include age, sex, race, and family status. For Part 4, Oakland Police Department Survey Data, Oakland County police officers were asked about why they joined the police force, how they perceived their role, aspects of a good and a bad police officer, why they believed crime was down, and how they would describe certain beats in terms of drug availability, crime rates, socioeconomic status, number of juveniles, potential for violence, residential versus commercial, and degree of danger. Officers were also asked about problems particular neighborhoods were experiencing, strategies for reducing crime, difficulties in doing police work well, and work conditions. Demographic variables include age, sex, race, marital status, level of education, and years on the force. In Part 5, Public Defender/District Attorney Survey Data, public defenders and district attorneys were queried regarding which offenses were increasing most rapidly in Oakland, and they were asked to rank certain offenses in terms of seriousness. Respondents were also asked about the public's influence on criminal justice agencies and on the performance of certain criminal justice agencies. Respondents were presented with a list of crimes and asked how typical these offenses were and what factors influenced their decisions about such cases (e.g., intent, motive, evidence, behavior, prior history, injury or loss, substance abuse, emotional trauma). Other variables measured how often and under what circumstances the public defender and client and the public defender and the district attorney agreed on the case, defendant characteristics in terms of who should not be put on the stand, the effects of Proposition 8, public defender and district attorney plea guidelines, attorney discretion, and advantageous and disadvantageous characteristics of a defendant. Demographic variables include age, sex, race, marital status, religion, years of experience, and area of responsibility.
This study sought to assess changes in the volume and types of homicide committed in Philadelphia, Phoenix, and St. Louis from 1980 to 1994 and to document the nature of those changes. Three of the eight cities originally studied by Margaret Zahn and Marc Riedel (NATURE AND PATTERNS OF HOMICIDE IN EIGHT AMERICAN CITIES, 1978 [ICPSR 8936]) were revisited for this data collection. In each city, police records were coded for each case of homicide occurring in the city each year from 1980 to 1994. Homicide data for St. Louis were provided by the St. Louis Homicide Project with Scott Decker and Richard Rosenfeld as the principal investigators. Variables describing the event cover study site, year of the case, date and time of assault, location of fatal injury, method used to kill the victim, and circumstances surrounding the death. Variables pertaining to offenders include total number of homicide and assault victims, number of offenders arrested, number of offenders identified, and disposition of event for offenders. Variables on victims focus on whether the victim was killed at work, if the victim was using drugs or alcohol, the victim's blood alcohol level, and the relationship of the victim to the offender. Demographic variables include age, sex, race, and marital status of victims and offenders.
Investigator(s): Bureau of Justice Statistics The National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) series was designed to achieve three primary objectives: to develop detailed information about the victims and consequences of crime, to estimate the number and types of crimes not reported to police, and to provide uniform measures of selected types of crime. All persons in the United States 12 years of age and older were interviewed in each household sampled. Each respondent was asked a series of screen questions to determine if he or she was victimized during the six-month period preceding the first day of the month of the interview. Screen questions cover the following types of crimes, including attempts: rape, robbery, assault, burglary, larceny, and motor vehicle theft. The data include type of crime; severity of the crime; injuries or losses; time and place of occurrence; medical expenses incurred; number, age, race, and sex of offender(s); and relationship of offender(s) to the victim (stranger, casual acquaintance, relative, etc.). Demographic information on household members includes age, sex, race, education, employment, median family income, marital status, and military history. A stratified multistage cluster sample technique was employed, with the person-level files consisting of a full sample of victims and a 10 percent sample of nonvictims for up to four incidents. The NCVS data are organized by collection quarter, and six quarters comprise an annual file. For example, for a 1979 file, the four quarters of 1979 are included as well as the first two quarters of 1980. NACJD has prepared a resource guide on NCVS. Years Produced: Updated annually
This is an Official Statistics bulletin produced by statisticians in the Ministry of Justice, Home Office and the Office for National Statistics. It brings together, for the first time, a range of official statistics from across the crime and criminal justice system, providing an overview of sexual offending in England and Wales. The report is structured to highlight: the victim experience; the police role in recording and detecting the crimes; how the various criminal justice agencies deal with an offender once identified; and the criminal histories of sex offenders.
Providing such an overview presents a number of challenges, not least that the available information comes from different sources that do not necessarily cover the same period, the same people (victims or offenders) or the same offences. This is explained further in the report.
Based on aggregated data from the ‘Crime Survey for England and Wales’ in 2009/10, 2010/11 and 2011/12, on average, 2.5 per cent of females and 0.4 per cent of males said that they had been a victim of a sexual offence (including attempts) in the previous 12 months. This represents around 473,000 adults being victims of sexual offences (around 404,000 females and 72,000 males) on average per year. These experiences span the full spectrum of sexual offences, ranging from the most serious offences of rape and sexual assault, to other sexual offences like indecent exposure and unwanted touching. The vast majority of incidents reported by respondents to the survey fell into the other sexual offences category.
It is estimated that 0.5 per cent of females report being a victim of the most serious offences of rape or sexual assault by penetration in the previous 12 months, equivalent to around 85,000 victims on average per year. Among males, less than 0.1 per cent (around 12,000) report being a victim of the same types of offences in the previous 12 months.
Around one in twenty females (aged 16 to 59) reported being a victim of a most serious sexual offence since the age of 16. Extending this to include other sexual offences such as sexual threats, unwanted touching or indecent exposure, this increased to one in five females reporting being a victim since the age of 16.
Around 90 per cent of victims of the most serious sexual offences in the previous year knew the perpetrator, compared with less than half for other sexual offences.
Females who had reported being victims of the most serious sexual offences in the last year were asked, regarding the most recent incident, whether or not they had reported the incident to the police. Only 15 per cent of victims of such offences said that they had done so. Frequently cited reasons for not reporting the crime were that it was ‘embarrassing’, they ‘didn’t think the police could do much to help’, that the incident was ‘too trivial or not worth reporting’, or that they saw it as a ‘private/family matter and not police business’
In 2011/12, the police recorded a total of 53,700 sexual offences across England and Wales. The most serious sexual offences of ‘rape’ (16,000 offences) and ‘sexual assault’ (22,100 offences) accounted for 71 per cent of sexual offences recorded by the police. This differs markedly from victims responding to the CSEW in 2011/12, the majority of whom were reporting being victims of other sexual offences outside the most serious category.
This reflects the fact that victims are more likely to report the most serious sexual offences to the police and, as such, the police and broader criminal justice system (CJS) tend to deal largely with the most serious end of the spectrum of sexual offending. The majority of the other sexual crimes recorded by the police related to ‘exposure or voyeurism’ (7,000) and ‘sexual activity with minors’ (5,800).
Trends in recorded crime statistics can be influenced by whether victims feel able to and decide to report such offences to the police, and by changes in police recording practices. For example, while there was a 17 per cent decrease in recorded sexual offences between 2005/06 and 2008/09, there was a seven per cent increase between 2008/09 and 2010/11. The latter increase may in part be due to greater encouragement by the police to victims to come forward and improvements in police recording, rather than an increase in the level of victimisation.
After the initial recording of a crime, the police may later decide that no crime took place as more details about the case emerge. In 2011/12, there were 4,155 offences initially recorded as sexual offences that the police later decided were not crimes. There are strict guidelines that set out circumstances under which a crime report may be ‘no crimed’. The ‘no-crime’ rate for sexual offences (7.2 per cent) compare