NCJ Number
210937
Date Published
February 2005
Length
8 pages
Annotation
This study examined the kinds of rape cases that were reported to the police in Finland for 1998-99, as well as the number that were prosecuted.
Abstract
The study encompassed all reported rape offenses for 1998-99. In addition to obtaining relevant police and court data, researchers interviewed appropriate criminal justice personnel to gain insight into approaches and attitudes toward the investigation and processing of sex-offense cases. The study focused on why so few rapes reported to the police have led to prosecutions. Of the 1,000 rape cases reported to the police in 1998-99, half involved alleged perpetrators who were acquaintances of the victim, and the scene of the offense was the home of the victim or the offender. Only 25 percent of the cases involved attacks by strangers. Intimate or family relations between alleged perpetrator and victim were present in 13 percent of the cases. The study found that a high percentage of cases did not reach the stage of prosecution because of the difficulty of identifying suspects when the perpetrator was a stranger to the victim, the reluctance of victims to proceed with cases that involved persons known to them or with whom they had been intimate in the past, and the difficulty of distinguishing coerced sex from consensual sex when perpetrators and victims were acquainted or previously intimate with one another. Some of these issues might be addressed through increased police training in the investigation of rape cases and the provision of trained support persons to guide victims in the pretrial stage of the case to help prevent victims from withdrawing legitimate charges. 2 tables and 2 figures