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Sexual violence in Australia

Statistics on the age and sex of offenders apprehended by police are available from five jurisdictions: Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, Western Australia and Tasmania. However, because definitions of what constitutes a sex offence differ across jurisdictions, they are not comparable. Despite this, some interesting and similar patterns emerge.

• Across these jurisdictions, about 98% of sex offenders apprehended by police are male;
• Males between the ages of 20 and 39 are the most likely to be arrested for sex offences;
• In Victoria, males in the 30-34 year age range had the highest rate of arrest for sex offences at 269.5 per 100,000 population;
• The rate for males between 30 and 39 was 596.3 per 100,000 male population;
• In Queensland, males in the 30-39 year age range again had the highest rate of arrest for sex offences, with 169.3 offenders per 100,000 male population;
• In South Australia, males between the ages of 20 and 34 had a rate of arrest for sex offences of 193.6 per 100,000 male population;
• In Western Australia, the highest rate of arrest for sex offending was for males between the ages of 25 and 34 237.8 per 100,000 male population;
• In Tasmania, the highest rate of arrest for sex offending was for males between the ages of 20 and 24 44.5 per 100,000 male population;
• An examination of New South Wales Criminal Court Statistics 1997 reveals a similar pattern. 98% of persons found guilty of sex offences were male (n=621);
• The highest rate of imprisonment for sex offences is for those between the ages of 40 and 44 (25.6 per 100,000 population);
• Only 10 women were found guilty of sex offences; seven of these were for sex offences against children.
  (New South Wales Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research 1998b, pp. 28-32, 76-80.)

Download: Sexual Violence in Australia ( 250Kb )

Source: Australian Institute of Criminology

Australian Crime: Facts and Figures, 2004

• Rates of sexual assault offending among the 15-19 age group increased from 40 to 52 per 100,000 persons between 1995-1996 and 2002-2003.
• The peak age in the commission of sexual assault for male offenders was 20-24 in 1995-1996 and 15-19 in 2002-2003.
• The peak age range fluctuated between these two age groups throughout this time frame.

Download: Australian Crime: Facts and Figures, 2004 ( 350Kb )

Source: Australian Institute of Criminology

Offenders characteristics

Study of Reported Rapes in Victoria 2000-2003

Of the 850 records considered across the entire sample:

• 99.4% of offenders were male.
• Whilst their median age was 33 years, 13 (2.6%) of alleged offenders were under 15 years of age.
• The age of 359 alleged offenders (42.2%) could not be established.
• More than one third of offenders (39.8%) were 'known' to police.
• Among those known, 72 (27.6%) were known due to prior allegations of sex offences made against them.
• At least 30 (11.5%) had been defendants of intervention orders at some time but not necessarily in relation to the victim.
• Of this latter group, 17 allegedly committed the offence while being the subject of active intervention orders against the victim.
• The police files identified 16 (1.9%) alleged offenders who were Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander.
• The Indigenous status of more than half of the sample (53.6% or 456) could not be established.
• Indigenous people are over-represented as offenders (ABS 2002).
• Information on the offender's country of birth and cultural identity was unavailable in the majority of records.
• Some case narratives included information about the alleged offender's background, indicating that there were 89 non-Australian born offenders from at least 34 different countries.
• In relation to country of birth, 72.8% of the records did not include this information.
• There were 554 offenders who were established as not having a disability (90.4%).

Profiles of offenders

The primary lines of defence used by alleged offenders who were interviewed and for whom there was information (n=349) was:

• That the victim consented to the sexual activity (107 or 30.7%).
• 81 denied the allegations (23.2%).
• 41 admitted contact but denied any sexual activity (11.7%).
• Some offenders made partial admissions to the offences (29 or 8.3%).
• Others made full admissions (28 or 8%).

Offenders with disabilities

• Among the 59 offenders in this study who were identified as having a disability (6.9% of the total), 25 had an intellectual disability and 18 had a psychiatric disability.
• In 38 of these cases, both victims and offenders were identified as having a disability.
• Eight of the victims in this context were male.
• 11 assaults occurred in institutional residences.
• Eight of the victims of offenders with a disability were male, a higher percentage than for the overall sample (13.6% male).
• Nearly a third of the victims were aged between 15 and 19 years at the time of the offence.
• Of the 59 cases where offenders had a disability, 14 (23.7%) resulted in charges being laid, a higher percentage than for the overall sample.
• Among those cases that did not go ahead, four (6.8%) resulted in a withdrawn complaint and 28 (47.5%) were no further police action.

Indigenous offenders

• While offenders' Indigenous status could not be established for over half of the cases examined, there were 16 (1.9% of the total sample) where police did identify the offender as Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander.
• All of the Indigenous offenders were male and their age ranged across all categories although, overall, Indigenous offenders were slightly older proportionate to the total sample.
• At least three victims were also Indigenous.

Download: Study of Reported Rapes in Victoria 2000-2003 ( 450Kb )

Source: Statewide Steering Committee to Reduce Sexual Assault

Recidivism

Sexual Violence in Australia, 2001

Broadhurst and Maller (1991) conducted a study in Western Australia and followed up sex offenders released from prison between July 1985 and June 1987. During the study period:

• 238 'rape' and 'sexual assault' offenders were released from prison.
• By the end of the period, 40% of released sexual assault offenders had returned to prison.
• 4% returned for the same type of sexual assault offence; and
• Another 4% returned for a different type of sex offence.
  (Broadhurst, R. & Maller, R. 1991, "Sex offenders: 'Career criminal' or 'criminal career'?", in Sex Offenders: Management Strategies for the 1990s, Office of Corrections, Victorian Health Department, Melbourne. pp. 46-7)

Download: Sexual Violence in Australia, 2001 ( 250Kb )

Source: Australian Institute of Criminology

Sex Offender Treatment Programs: Effectiveness of Prison and Community Based Programs in Australia and New Zealand 2008

A 2007 evaluation of the Sex Offender Programs (SOP) unit in Victoria examined recidivism rates of 330 offenders who entered the program (follow up period: average 4.5 years). They found that:

• Offenders categorised by STATIC 99 as high-risk were much more likely to reoffend sexually than those categorised as low, medium-low and medium-high risk.
• 4% of SOP treatment completers reoffended sexually.
• 20% of those who withdrew from SOP reoffended sexually.
• 10% of those who were removed from SOP reoffended sexually.

Download: Sex Offender Treatment Programs: Effectiveness of Prison and Community Based Programs in Australia and New Zealand 2008 ( 120Kb )

Source: The Indigenous Justice Clearinghouse

Overseas reports

Recidivism Sex Offenders Research Paper 2007

A recent meta-analysis published in 2002 combined the findings from 43 studies of psychological treatment for adult male sex offenders that had been conducted in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and New Zealand.

The 43 studies examined 5,078 treated sex offenders and 4,376 untreated sex offenders over an average follow-up period of 46 months.

• The sexual offence recidivism rate was lower for the treatment groups (12.3%) than for the comparison groups (16.8%).
• 27.9% of the treatment groups re-offended, compared with 39.2% of the comparison groups (Hanson et al., 2002, p.181).
• An earlier meta-analysis found treated sex offenders had a sexual recidivism rate of 19%, whereas untreated offenders had a sexual recidivism rate of 27%.

Download: Recidivism Sex Offenders Research Paper 2007 ( 711Kb )

Source: The Sentencing Advisory Council

Responding to Sexual Offenses

American studies have found that of people convicted of sex offenses:

• 5.3% of sex offenders were rearrested for any type of new sex crime within three years after release from prison.
• Sex offenders had lower overall rearrest rates than people convicted of non-sexual crimes: 43% of people convicted of sex offenses were rearrested post release compared to a 68% rearrest rate for people convicted of crimes other than sex offenses.

Download: Responding to Sexual Offenses ( 66Kb )

Source: The Center for Community Alternatives (USA)

Male rape

• 50% of the offender population described their consenting sexual encounters to be with women only.
• 38% had consenting sexual encounters with men and women.
• 50% of the victim population was strictly heterosexual.

Among the offenders studied, the gender of the victim did not appear to be of specific significance to half of the offenders. Instead, they appeared to be relatively indiscriminate with regard to their choice of a victim - that is, their victims included both males and females, as well as both adults and children.
The choice of a victim seemed to be more a matter of accessibility than of sexual orientation, gender or age.

Download: Male Rape ( 89Kb )

Source: National Center for Victims of Crime (USA)

Young offenders

Young People and Sexually Harmful Behaviour in Scotland 2006

In the UK, information was gathered on 189 Scottish children and young people referred or active in 2004.

Age

The age of children and young people at January 2005 was established for 171 of the 189 returns. This ranged from 5 to 20 years old, with the highest proportion (36%) being aged 13 to 15 years. Those aged 16 to 17 comprised a further 24% of the sample, with those aged 8 to 12 comprising 19%.

• Estimates suggest that between a quarter and a third of all cases of sexual abuse in the UK are perpetrated by children and young people.
• In a six year follow-up study of a sample of 148 adolescents, only 5% of young people who had been offered 'treatment' as a result of their sexual behaviours had reoffended sexually in this time period, compared with 18% of those who had not received such intervention.

Gender

In this Scottish sample:

• 94% were male.
• 6% (11) were female.
• 18% of females were residing with their parents at time of referral.
• 49% of males were residing with their parents at time of referral.
• females were more likely to have been reported as experiencing emotional abuse and neglect.
• 82% of females recorded their early care-giving environment as 'insecure'.
• 47% of males recorded their early care-giving environment as 'insecure'.
• With regard to problematic or harmful sexual behaviour itself, all females were recorded as perpetrating contact behaviour only and all knew their victims.

Victims

• Almost three-quarters of the children and young people had been involved with three victims or less;
• 41% were only involved with one victim;
• Over one quarter had four or more victims recorded;
• In most recorded cases (73%) young people knew their victims, with the victim frequently a sibling (27%);
• Victims were more likely to be female (70%) than male (61%);
• 39% were recorded as having female victims only;
• 29% were recorded as having male victims only; and
• 32% both male and female victims.
• Males were less likely to have only male victims, while female were likely to have only male victims.
• Unknown victims were recorded in only 15% of cases and this increased with the age of the young person.
• Only males were recorded as being involved with unknown victims and only in a very small number (5%) had a mix of known and unknown victims recorded.
• Concerning non sexual behaviour was also recorded for almost half of the children and young people (47%).
• Incidents of interpersonal violence and bullying were recorded for nearly a quarter of them (23% in each case).
• In a very small number of cases (10% or less in each category), incidents such as animal cruelty, self-harm, substance misuse, fire-raising and inappropriate urination/defecation were recorded in individual cases.

Download: Young People and Sexually Harmful Behaviour in Scotland 2006 ( 307Kb )

Source: Criminal Justice Social Work Development Centre

Related reports

This is not an exhaustive list of research in the area of family violence and sexual assault, merely a starting point. As the locations of web pages often change, many of these reports have been made available through this page to assist readers. Please note that these pdfs may not contain the latest version or any recent changes so it is recommended that researchers check the author's website for updates, suplements or amendments. All published details correct as at July 2009.

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Disclaimer Copyright Updated: 12 Jul 2010