RAPE CRIMES DOUBLE IN THREE YEARS
More rape crimes recorded by the police than ever before
FIVE rapes are registered as crimes each hour by police in England and Wales - the highest figure ever recorded.
Data from the Home Office shows that in 2016/17, police recorded some 41,186 rapes as crimes.
That is an increase of nearly 200 per cent from the 13,774 reported rapes 10 years earlier.
By 2012/13, some 16,374 rapes were being registered as crimes in England and Wales. The following year this jumped to 20,751.
Approximately nine out of 10 alleged rapes in 2016/17 had female victims.
Of those, 26,464 involved a woman of 16 or older, 5,822 a girl aged 13-15, and 4,369 a girl aged under 13.
Some 1,625 alleged rapes involved a male victim aged 16 or older, 820 a male victim aged 1315, and 2,086 a male victim aged under 13.
Despite the number of recorded rape crimes, only 5,190 were prosecuted and just 2,991 saw convictions.
The rise in reported rapes does not necessarily mean that the crime is happening more often than it was five or ten years ago. Rather, it might also reflect increased confidence in victims to come forward and contact the police. The implication of that argument is that tens of thousands of rapes that happened in previous years went unreported, and therefore unprosecuted - with the perpetrator simply getting away with it. A Home Office spokesperson said: “The rise in the number of recorded rapes and sexual offences is likely to be due to greater victim confidence and better recording by the police rather than more assaults taking place.
“It is encouraging that more victims than ever before have the confidence to come forward and we expect every rape to be properly recorded and investigated.”
Rape Crisis, England and Wales’ leading rape charity, said specialist services were accessed by 67,059 individuals in 2016/17. That is more than the 41,186 cases recorded as crimes by the Home Office, suggesting nearly 26,000 people did not go on to report a rape to police. The charity added that there may well be other individuals who did not access Rape Crisis help at all. That means there could still be a significant problem of under-reporting - with Rape Crisis believing it remains a particular problem in cases where the victim knows the perpetrator. The findings come as every rape and serious sexual assault case in the country is under review following the collapse of