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Demographic and Situational Factors Affecting Injury, Resistance, Completion, and Charges Brought in Sexual Assault Cases: What is Best for Arrest?

NCJ Number
208986
Journal
Violence and Victims Volume: 19 Issue: 4 Dated: August 2004 Pages: 479-493
Author(s)
Hannah S. Scott; Rebecca Beaman
Date Published
August 2004
Length
15 pages
Annotation
This study examined demographic and situational factors in an effort to predict whether or not a complainant was injured, used resistance, experienced a completed assault, and whether charges were brought against the offender.
Abstract
Sexual assault is defined as any unwanted sexual advance which involved any physical contact. To obtain more in-depth study on the crime of sexual assault and its correlates, this study used police data and examined precursory or demographic and transactional or proximate variables and their predictive value for four victim outcomes: injury, resistance, sexual assault completion, and charges brought in sexual assault cases. The study examined all sexual assault cases that were reported to a Western Canadian police service from January 1996 through May 1996. The final sample consisted of 108 cases. Results indicate that physical resistance strategies were utilized significantly more often when the offender was non-Caucasian, when the offender threatened the victim with a weapon, or when the offender physically assaulted the victim before sexually assaulting her. Physical resistance strategies were less likely to be used if the complainant was asleep or unconscious. The study assumes that sexual assault is a sequence of events which come together in time and space, the end product of which is a criminal act. Tables, references