Police hope to use sex-assault data to allocate resources

MacEwan psychology prof studied more than 2,500 cases occurring over four years

The Edmonton Police Service will review the findings of a research paper investigating four years of sexual assault data to see how it could shape future investigations.

Author Sandy Jung, an associate professor of psychology at MacEwan University, shared her findings Thursday with police and the Edmonton Police Commission, outlining characteristics of sexual assault cases in Edmonton.

Her paper also looked to see if existing sexual violence risk assessment measures could be used to “predict further violent and sexual offending, specifically future criminal charges and convictions.”

Jung’s research concluded that “the use of risk assessment may be helpful by allocating more resources to higher risk perpetrators and therefore reduce further perpetration of sexual violence.”

Following her presentation, Jung said using an “empirically validated” method to help identify, monitor and shape things such as bail conditions to prevent further sexual assaults was crucial.

“I think that’s more pertinent because then we are preventing them from entering the community and committing a further assault,” she said.

Jung’s report whittled 2,569 occurrences of sexual assaults against victims aged 16 and older between 2010 and 2014 to 865 distinct cases where a perpetrator could be identified.

Jung also used a randomly selected sample of 300 cases to further examine offence, perpetrator and victim characteristics.

Here are some of the key numbers from the research:

93.3%

of offences were committed by males against females. The average age of female victims was 28.

52.4%

of female victims were white and another 30.7 per cent of female victims were aboriginal.

26.5%

of cases were white perpetrators assaulting white victims. Just under 14 per cent of cases were aboriginal perpetrators assaulting aboriginal victims. A small proportion of cases involved white perpetrators versus aboriginal victims, and vice versa, at 8.8 per cent and 10.9 per cent, respectively. 81.6% of sampled cases did not involve any witnesses. 28.1% Edmonton Police Service clearance rate of sexual assault investigations between 2010 and 2014. 90% of cases reported to police within two weeks of occurrence.

86%

of cases involved victims reporting offence directly to the police.

32.3%

of reported cases occurred in the victim’s residence (the national average is seven per cent). 28.7% of the cases occurred in a public setting.

27%

of victims were unconscious at the time of sexual assault, i.e., they were either asleep or passed out.

42%

of cases were committed by non-familial acquaintances, with another 16 per cent were committed by current or past dating or cohabiting intimate partners. Just over 37 per cent of cases were committed by strangers. Less than five per cent of studied cases were committed by family members.

27%

of cases involved nonsexual violence. Weapons were used in three per cent of Edmonton sexual assaults, which is in line with national figures.

21%

of identified perpetrators had prior convictions for criminal behaviour.

I think that’s more pertinent because then we are preventing them from entering the community and committing a further assault.