Crisis? What Crisis? Rape Statistics for England and Wales
Before we answer the question, we have to acknowledge the facts – 70,000 rapes a year now, but only 20,000 in 2013 We’ll look at the data first and then look at the perpetrators. There has been a steady rise since they launch of Operation Yew Tree, a police investigation into sex cries launched in the wake of the Jimmy Savile scandal, so perhaps an increase in reporting rape has also taken place
On the other hand:
The light blue line on the bottom records the figures for rape. In percentage terms not much has changed, although the population has increased by 3.5 million since 2013, mainly down to immigration.
Sexual Assault Stats & Facts – 2023 A report from the Criminal Injuries Helpline
How many women are raped every year in the UK?
The most recent report published by the Office of National Statistics shows rape offences have increased dramatically in England and Wales since 2012/13. The number of rape offences in
the year ending June 2021 was 61,158. The charity ‘Rape Crisis’ has reported 1 in 4 women being raped or sexually assaulted as an adult and the highest number of rape cases reported to the police
in march 2022 was 70,330. The overall statistics in England and Wales found that 85,000 women experience rape, attempted rape or sexual assault every year.
Prevalence of Sexual Violence
London accounts for 15% of all recorded sexual offences across England and Wales.
75-95% of victims of sexual assault and harassment never report incidents to the police
However the number of recorded sexual offences has increased in recent years. This increase follows the Savile scandal and the so called “Yewtree effect” reported by ONS.
Non-current sexual offences as recorded by the MPS increased by 121% in the 3 years to 2016 with recorded historic rape offences increasing by 111%.
However it was found that victims did not report sexual violence because they felt it did not seem serious enough and they would not be taken seriously, while not knowing who to report to.
9 in 10 offenders proceeded against for sexual offences in the year were charged with the Offence.
CPS data for sexual offences shows that in 2015/16 there were 1,920 prosecutions for sex offences in London. Convictions occurred in 73% of these – this is compared to the national rate
of 78%
Perpetrators – Offender Ethnicity
In August 2024 a right wing politician claimed that data she’d seen showed that foreign born people were disproportionately responsible for this increase in rapes. I could not find any such data, but a 2016 news article in the Daily Express claimed much the same thing. It said that FOI requests to the UK’s police forces had elicited the fact that nearly 20% of those charged with rape had been born abroad. That seems neither unreasonable or unlikely. 10-12% of the population are not UK nationals and half a million new migrants a year are welcomed into Britain.
Part of the problem with the available data is that ethnicity is not an accurate identifier of immigration status. The MoJ will produce data on the ethnicity of rapists, but not their immigration status. The police on the other hand do record the place of birth of their suspects. Anyone born outside the UK is likely to be an immigrant.
COWBURN, M., LAVIS, V. and WALKER, T. (2008). Black and minority ethnic sex offenders. Prison service journal, 178, 44-49
Old data I know but, in England and Wales the majority of the population classify themselves a
87.5% White
4.4% Asian
2.2% Black
1.4% mixed race,
At that time there were 8,106 male sex offenders in the prisons of England and Wales. Of this group,
81.9% White;
9.9% Black
5.6% Asian
2.2% are Other/mixed race
“Explanations for this phenomenon range from the racist (i.e. certain ethnic groups are more prone to commit sex offences) to the anti-racist, (i.e. the Criminal Justice System is negatively discriminatory towards BME people).” That’s a quote from the authors, who took the view that it was racist to think that all ethnicities partook in identical behaviours. They were wrong.
From this we see that Black and Asians are over represented. So this is not a new phenomenon. The paper goes on to say:
“BME sex offenders are hugely over represented in the younger groups (for example, in the 21-29 year old group, Black offenders are 16.8 per cent of this group and Asian offenders are 13.2 per cent – together they represent 30 percent of the whole group).
The distinct profile of the male BME sex offender group in prisons is further developed by consideration of the types of offences that the various groups are most commonly convicted. As in 1989 the majority of BME offenders are serving sentences for sexual offending against adults, in particular for rape. Just over 59 per cent of the male sex offenders in prison are serving sentences
for offences against adults. In this offence-type group, the proportion of BME offenders is significantly higher than in the group that have offended against children (Black and Asian offenders constituting over 20 per cent of the group, compared to just over 7 percent for the group with child victims).”
Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service Offender Equalities Annual Report
2021/22
“White prisoners made up almost three quarters (72%) of the prison population
On 31 March 2022, prisoners who self-declared as being from a black or black British ethnic background made up 13% of the prison population in England and Wales.
Prisoners who declared their ethnicity as Asian, Asian British, mixed or other ethnic group represented 15% of all prisoners.
These proportions have remained fairly similar since 2013. The majority (33%) of prisoners were in the 30 to 39 age group As at 31 March 2022, the second largest group were in the 40 to 49 age group which covered 19% (15,179) of the prison population. For all age groups there was little change in proportion compared to the previous year.
Almost half (45%) of the prison population that specified a religion or belief self-identified as being Christian in March 2022 As of 31 March 2022, 32% (25,068) prisoners identified as having no religion and 17% (13,858) identified as a Muslim. In the latest quarter, 97% of prisoners who declared a sexual orientation reported that they were heterosexual This is broadly comparable with trends reported over the past ten years.”
MOJ Table 3: Defendants1 proceeded against at magistrates’ courts by sexual offence group and ethnicity2, year ending December 2017
This deals with the ethnicity of people being charged. Again Blacks and Asians are over represented:
Sentenced:
It will be noted that white men and gay sex offences is more of a thing than blacks and Asians
Statistics on Ethnicity and the Criminal Justice System, 2022 from the MoJ
Amongst offenders committing sexual offences, no ethnic groups were significantly more or less likely to be sentenced to custody relative to the white ethnic group.
Domestic Abuse in Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic Groups | Interventions Alliance
“The Office for National Statistics (2019) data shows that in the year 2018-2019, the rates of domestic abuse amongst BAME communities were higher than their white counterparts, and rates of domestic abuse were highest amongst those of mixed ethnicity.
White victims represented 5.6% of the victim population, Asian/ Asian British people made up 3.8%, and black victims made up 7.1%, whilst mixed race victims made up 12.9% (Office for National Statistics, 2019; table 7b).”
London Sexual Violence Needs Assessment 2016
Victims:
• Largest single category of sexual assault was on females age 13 and over
• Child victims of sexual offences accounted for 27% of all reported sexual offences in 2016/17
Offenders
• People of black ethnicity are over-represented in reports to the police of sexual violence, whilst
people from the Asian population are under represented.
Offenders – The data from Abroad
A 2016 news article in the Daily Express claimed that FOI requests to the UK’s police forces had elicited the fact that nearly 20% of those charged with rape had been born abroad. That seems neither unreasonable or unlikely. 10-12% of the population are not UK nationals and half a million new migrants a year are welcomed into Britain. About a third of forces did not comply with the FOI requests, so the data is incomplete.
Therefore we turn now to an actual study of rapists, taking into account where they were born. It took place in Sweden, and it should be noted that the Swedish government didn’t like what it read and threatened the authors with legal proceedings
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/349504900_Swedish_rape_offenders_-_a_latent_class_analysis
“The journal Forensic Sciences Research, published a paper on “Swedish rape offenders”, in which they analyze the characteristics of individuals between 15-60 years old who were convicted of “rape+” against women in Sweden between 2000 and 2015. The term “rape+” here refers to both acts of rape and attempted rape, including aggravated cases.
The researchers found that, within that time-frame, a total of 3,039 offenders were convicted of rape+ against a woman in Sweden — nearly all of whom (99.7%) were men. According to the researchers, Swedish-born offenders with Swedish-born parents accounted for 40.8% of the offenders. But, strikingly, almost half of the offenders were born outside of Sweden (47.7%). Of those foreign-born offenders, 34.5% were from the Middle East/North Africa, with 19.1% hailing from the rest of Africa. As a percentage of all convicted perpetrators, therefore, 16.4% were foreign-born individuals from the Middle East/North Africa, and 9.1% were foreign-born individuals from Africa (excluding North Africa).
How far does this signify over-representation? On the basis of population records kept by the official agency Statistics Sweden (SCB), approximately 20% (19.7%) of the Swedish population are foreign-born individuals. Among those convicted of rape and perpetrated rape, the foreign-born account for 47.7% of those convicted — so they are over-represented by a factor of 2.4.
Moreover, if we piece various statistics together, we find there are 565,902 foreign-born people living in Sweden who were born in North Africa and the Middle East, representing 4.9% of Sweden’s population. Yet 16.4% of those convicted of rape and attempted rape are foreign-born individuals from North Africa and the Middle East: over-representation by a factor of 3.3. And that figure rises to 4.7 when you consider all foreign-born citizens from Africa (excluding North Africa.)”
Swedish national TV says 58% of men convicted of rape in the past five years were born abroad.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-45269764
“Public broadcaster SVT said it had counted all court convictions to present a complete picture in Sweden. The SVT programme revealed that in cases where the victim did not know the attacker, the proportion of foreign-born offenders was more than 80%. A former police officer born in Afghanistan told the programme that some young Afghans who had come to Sweden in recent years had views that differed significantly from Sweden’s idea of sexual equality.”
Sweden: Researchers face prosecution for a study that showed most rapes are committed by immigrants
Sweden’s Lund University Professor found in her study that majority of rapes were committed by immigrants. Ethical body has initiated an investigation against her initiated for publishing the report. | OpIndia News
https://www.opindia.com/2021/11/sweden-lund-university-researcher-faces-prosecution-for-study-post-rapes-committed-by-immigrants/
Europe
In a 2009 EU funded report by the London Metropolitan University, researchers collated rape data from countries across Europe. The Child and Woman Abuse Studies Unit followed 100 rape cases in each country and found that ‘white’ rapists only accounted for 445 out of 800 offenders.
A full copy of the report is to be found at http://fellowship.birn.eu.com/en/file/show/jelena_blog4_lizkellyreport.pdf
Country Percentage of white rapists
Austria 45%
Belgium 41%
Germany 60%
Hungary 98%
Ireland 98%
Portugal 42%
Sweden 48%
From these eight countries in Europe it seems that black people, and indeed other ethnic minorities, are disproportionately represented in rape statistics, especially offender statistics. The reports authors wisely draw no conclusions. France’s constitution is colour-blind and the country doesn’t collect ethnic statistics in the way we do. However before drawing any comparisons, it should be pointed out that 75% of Europe’s black population live in France or the UK. Outside these two countries the vast majority of Europe’s black population comes from Africa, not the Caribbean. Britain’s black population is split between those from African and those from the Caribbean.
USA
It is believed that most rapes go unreported and additionally that most rapes are intraracial, ie black men mostly rape black women and white men mostly rape white women. The statistics might quite bear this out, although ethnicity isn’t always recorded the same way in the USA. Stats were taken from – https://bjs.ojp.gov/ – US Department of Justice.
Offender Ethnicity
As reported by the Victim: General Population Percentages
White 57% 61% White
Black 27% 13% Black
Mixed 15% 18% Hispanic
Unknown 8% 6% Asian
Other 6% Mixed 3%
American Indian 1%
USA 2016 Population Taken from https://www.statista.com/statistics/270272/percentage-of-us-population-by-ethnicities/ :
See Also
https://www.rainn.org/statistics/perpetrators-sexual-violence
Notes:
White attribution closely matches their percentage of the population. Blacks are raping at twice the rate, ‘mixed’ at 5 times the rate, and so on. It should be borne in mind though, that in one set of statistics, women victims are deciding the colour of the offender, and are perhaps more subjective than other statistical sources.
Cultural Influences
Rightly or wrongly British culture is heavily influenced by America. We see this in how people dress, the music they follow and the amount of US content on their screens they watch. These might include music, language, literature and TV/Movies. We’ll discount books, because most of us don’t read books. TV and Movies are both regulated and/or censored on both sides of the channel. Music is different. It’s popular culture, and led from the bottom up, not top down. Lyrically, you can say things in music which you wouldn’t put in a sermon.
“Rape culture is evident in the choice of music by the American population. The findings show that rap/hip-hop music does provide the audience with more misogynistic views against women than any other genre of music. This contributes to the idea of rape culture. Because rap/hip-hop is the most popular music genre, misogynistic lyrics are being heard more frequently. This can be especially problematic for adolescents because of their own behaviors and attitudes are greatly impacted and influenced by media sources, like music choices (Kistler et al, 2010). When they constantly hear these ideas of degrading women and men in music, over time those behaviors appear to be normal. “
In some academic research at https://uca.edu/cahss/files/2020/07/Gray-CLA-2019.pdf, it seems that aggressive behaviour to women is present in 85% of Rap and Hip Hop music, but only 8% of country music, and a similar statistic presents itself for misogynistic lyrics in general. Rap and Hip Hop are predominantly black music genres. For details of American influence on the UK music scene see: https://www.files.ethz.ch/isn/46647/AS13.pdf
