ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, February 3, 1997 TAG: 9702030123
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-3 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: WASHINGTON
The number of rapes and sexual assaults reported in 1995 fell to the lowest level since 1989, the Justice Department reported Sunday.
In 1995, law enforcement agencies recorded 97,000 rapes, the lowest number since 1989, and the lowest rate per capita since 1985, the Bureau of Justice Statistics reported in a study titled ``Sexual Offenses and Offenders.''
The data also reveal that residents 12 years and older reported one rape or violent sexual assault for every 624 men and women during 1995. This reflects a drop from 1993, when one person was a victim of sexual violence for every 435 residents.
Law enforcement agents made arrests in 34,650 reported cases of forcible rape, or about half of all cases reported.
The study found some common characteristics in offenders, said Jan Chaiken, the director of the bureau.
``The data all point to a sex offender who is older than other violent offenders, generally in his early 30s, and more likely to be white than other violent offenders,'' Chaiken wrote in the study's foreword.
The study also profiled victims. Per-capita rates of rape and sexual assault are the highest against young men and women 16- to 19-years-old, urban residents, and low-income residents.
Forty-four percent of rape victims were younger than 18 years old, and two-thirds of violent sex offenders serving time in state prisons said their victims were younger than 18 years old.
About 5.5 percent of the rape victims were male, and about 15.5 percent of the sexual assault victims were male.
Most victims and the offenders had a prior relationship as family members, intimates, or acquaintances. For adults, this was true in three out of four cases, while for child victims younger than 12, the rate was 90 percent.
The study's data reflected only sexual offenses that were reported. The study's authors estimate that two-thirds of sexual assault victims did not report the crime.
- New York Times
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