Few sex assault reports deemed unfounded in ’17

‘We didn’t want to Be A Barrier’ for people reporting: City police Chief

Just two per cent of sexual assaults reported to Saskatoon city police were deemed unfounded last year, well below the national and provincial averages.

According to a Statistics Canada report published this week, 14 per cent of sexual assaults reported across the country and 13 per cent of sexual assaults reported in Saskatchewan were deemed unfounded by police in 2017. In other words, police determined the sexual assaults had not occurred, or that insufficient evidence was available on which to base a charge.

The rate of unfounded sexual assaults in Saskatoon was two per cent, compared to 13 per cent in Regina and Prince Albert and 24 per cent in Moose Jaw.

Saskatoon Police Chief Troy Cooper said he is pleased with the city’s number.

“We know that sexual assaults, for the most part, are under-reported and we didn’t want to contribute to that under-reporting, we didn’t want to be a barrier for people who came in and, through a report to the police, (were) thinking that they weren’t believed.”

The last time Statistics Canada published data on unfounded sexual assaults was in 2003.

Statistics Canada conducts an annual uniform crime reporting survey and asks police forces to classify criminal incidents as founded or unfounded. The organization found that inconsistent reporting of unfounded incidents led to poor data quality and stopped disseminating the data.

Then, last year, the Globe and Mail published an investigation that looked into why sexual assault complaints are more likely than other cases to be stamped as unfounded. The Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police encouraged police services to review their practices around sexual assault investigations.

Representatives from police organizations worked with Statistics Canada to reinstate standardized reporting of unfounded incidents through the survey.

Saskatoon police were among the many services across the country that reviewed their unfounded sexual assault complaints after the Globe and Mail’s investigation.

Retired Insp. Shelley Ballard, who conducted the review, said the newspaper’s publication — entitled “Why police dismiss 1 in 5 sexual assault claims as baseless” — led people to conclude that police did not believe victims of sexual assault and weren’t doing proper investigations.

Ballard’s review, which wrapped up late last year, suggested this wasn’t the case in Saskatoon. The overwhelming majority of the 284 sexual assault complaints Saskatoon police deemed unfounded between 2011 and 2016 — 82 per cent — clearly fit into an unfounded category because police investigations revealed that no offence had occurred, a complaint was found to be false or the sexual activity was found to be consensual.

In its report, Statistics Canada notes the number of sexual assaults reported to police rose last year, while the proportion of reports deemed unfounded dropped. One in seven sexual assault cases was deemed unfounded in 2017, compared to one in five in 2016.

More severe sexual assaults are less likely to be deemed unfounded than less severe sexual assaults. Sexual assaults are classified into one of three categories: level one (violations of a sexual nature that did not involve weapons or evidence of bodily harm), level two (sexual assaults that involve weapons, bodily harm or threats of bodily harm) and level three (sexual assaults that wound, maim, disfigure or endanger the life of a victim).

Nationwide, 14 per cent of level one sexual assaults were deemed unfounded compared to seven per cent of level two sexual assaults and nine per cent of level three sexual assaults.

In Saskatoon, 281 sexual assaults were reported to police last year: 277 level one assaults, two level two assaults and two level three assaults. Six level one complaints were deemed unfounded.