Rapes and robberies up in new force’s first year

But Police Scotland says figures are ‘extremely encouraging’

RAPES and housebreakings have soared in the first year of the single police force, new figures revealed yesterday.

The number of reported rapes has risen to nearly 1,700 in the last year – up by almost a quarter – while an average of two break-ins are reported every hour.

Police Scotland, publishing its first annual report following its creation in April last year, claimed the rise in rape allegations was in fact ‘extremely encouraging’, as it showed increased confidence in reporting the crime among women victims – around a quarter of whom are under 15.

But it comes after a mass anti-rape demonstration in Glasgow this month following a spate of unsolved attacks.

The new figures also show despite a rise in ‘detection’ rates, nearly 30 per cent of rapes are unsolved.

Police pointed to a 10 per cent fall in violent crime as proof the new force was performing well, but last night the statistics fuelled concern over muddled police priorities.

Scottish Tory justice spokesman Margaret Mitchell said: ‘Recently there has been a lot of focus on speeding offences and stop and search and though they are important, Police Scotland must not take their eye off the ball in respect of sexual violence.’

The figures, published yesterday by Chief Constable Sir Stephen House, showed 1,690 rapes were reported in 2013-14, up by 318 or 23 per cent in the last year.

Detection rates – where police report a suspect to prosecutors – have risen in the last three years by about 10 per cent to 72 per cent.

Police said 36 per cent of rapes were ‘historic’ – reported more than a year after the attack. They also pointed to a rise in the percentage of reported domestic rapes.

There has been an increase of 397 – 13 per cent – in sexual assaults, from 3,008 to 3,405 and the detection rate is 71 per cent.

The figures show there were 22,272 housebreakings, including attempted break-ins, in 2013-14 – a 3.5 per cent rise from 21,515.

Motor vehicle crime increased by 743 – about 4 per cent – to 19,797 while ‘crimes of dishonesty,’ including housebreaking, rose by 1,425 or

‘Must not take their eye off ball’

1 per cent to 137,324. This category also includes theft and shoplifting.

Crimes of violence fell by 745 to 6,785, a drop of around 10 per cent, with murders remaining unchanged at 56. Total crimes reported fell from 273,053 to 270,500, a small decrease of 0.9 per cent.

Commenting on the rise in rapes, Sir Stephen said that thanks to changes made by police ‘ more victims of sexual crime including rape are willing to report to the police and more offenders are being caught by officers’.

Detective Superintendent Louise Raphael, chairman of the police rape and sexual crime external advisory group, described the rise in reporting of historical rapes as ‘extremely encouraging,’ at a briefing at Police Scotland HQ in Tulliallan, Clackmannanshire.

Sandy Brindley, national co-ordinator of Rape Crisis Scotland, said some of the rise in rape reports ‘will be due to increased confidence in survivors coming forward’ but ‘only by fundamentally changing attitudes towards rape within Scottish society will we see levels of sexual crime start to fall’.

Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill welcomed the overall figures as a ‘positive indication that crime continues to fall’.

But Scottish Labour j ustice spokesman Graeme Pearson said that it was ‘too easy to claim the increase in reported sexual crimes is due to a greater confidence in the authorities’.