NCJ Number
225697
Journal
Child Abuse & Neglect Volume: 32 Issue: 12 Dated: December 2008 Pages: 1109-1118
Date Published
December 2008
Length
10 pages
Annotation
This paper presents an exploratory analysis of sexual offenses recorded by the Police Service for Northern Ireland.
Abstract
The overall detection rate for both child and adult offenses was 49 percent; results confirmed that the case characteristics and outcomes of recorded sexual offenses involving child victims vary significantly across a number of variables from those involving adults. In terms of case characteristics, there was more than a 10 percent difference between the children and adults in relation to gender, offense type, offender-victim relationship, and reporting delay. This has implications for how these cases are perceived and dealt with by professionals, particularly as many of these factors are also associated with case outcomes. Cases of child sexual abuse were more likely to be detected with a formal sanction if the child was aged 5-13. Cases involving strangers or family members/relatives were also more likely to be detected with a formal sanction. The victim declining to prosecute most commonly occurred in cases involving boyfriends/girlfriends as the offender. The findings also revealed that sexual offenses involving children were more likely than those involving adults to be detected by the police (52 percent versus 45 percent). There appears to be an ongoing concern over low conviction rates for sexual offenses across the United Kingdom, despite a range of legislative and policy developments. Figure, tables, and references