Number of rapes soars by 40pc in Covid crimewave

RAPE reports have soared by more than 40 per cent during one month of lockdown as fraud rocketed by more than half.

Scottish Government figures show knife crime is also up by a quarter despite official claims that blader elated offending is in decline.

Violent crime was 4 per cent higher in July 2020 than in July 2019, which follows a rise in violence over the four financial years to 2018-19.

It comes amid fears that officer numbers will have to be reduced as Police Scotland top brass predict a £50million deficit next year.

Tory justice spokesman Liam Kerr said: ‘These repeated increases in violent and sexual crime, and others, highlight the failure of the SNP’s soft touch approach to justice.

‘The SNP Government has failed to properly resource Police Scotland or maintain frontline policing numbers.’

He added ministers ‘must abandon their soft touch approach, give Police Scotland the resources they need and victims the justice they deserve’.

Scottish Government figures show there were 255 reports of rape and attempted rape in July 2020 compared with 179 in July 2019, a rise of 42 per cent. Violent crime was 4 per cent higher, up from 794 to 823.

The increase in violent crime was fuelled by a 17 per cent rise in robbery (134 to 157), and a 6 per cent rise in domestic abuse (140 to 148).

Crimes involving offensive weapons, largely knives, were up from 463 to 581, a 25 per cent increase.

And the number of fraud reports rose from 991 to 1,534 – a 55 per cent increase – as people did more shopping online.

Overall there were 42,008 crimes in July, down from 44,483 last year. There were 4,631 crimes related to breaches of lockdown from April to July.

Sandy Brindley of Rape Crisis

Scotland called the increase in reported sex attacks ‘astonishingly high’, and pointed out that the backlog in courts caused by Covid-19 means people face ‘agonisingly long waits’ for cases to come to trial.

Detective Superintendent Fil Capaldi, head of Police Scotland’s sexual crime unit, said it ‘will take time to understand the impact lockdown has had on both offending and reporting of sexual crime’.

However, he added: ‘We will take action on all reports of sexual crime.’

A Scottish Government spokesman said: ‘While there is less crime and fewer victims than a decade ago, the impact on victims, particularly of sexual or violent crime, is often devastating.

‘That’s why we are strengthening how the justice system and other public services support victims, while investing in both law enforcement and crime prevention.’

‘The failure of soft touch justice’