Number of Rapes 2007-2008

  • Reference Number: 1790
  • Date released: 15 April 2009

Request

  1. How many rapes / claims of rape were reported to your force in the April 2007 to April 2008 period?
  2. How many of those reported were listed as "no crime having taken place?
  3. How many were actually prosecuted?
  4. How many prosecutions ultimately ended in a conviction? (for accuracy - if possible - please do also state if any cases being taken to prosecution are yet to be disposed of).
  5. If applicable to your force...of the cases prosecuted.... how many had a Specially Trained Officer (STO) assigned from start to finish as recommended (recommendation 7 - p97) by the HMPCSI and HMCI Thematic report: Without Consent? Please state the percentage of successful prosecutions which had such an officer and the number of unsuccessful prosecutions which had such an officer.

Response

In accordance with section 1 (1) (b) of the Act our response is provided below;

Question 1

The number of rapes reported from 1st April 2007 to 31st March 2008 was 183. A further 18 rapes were reported from 1st April 2008 to 30th April 2008.

Question 2

The number of reported rapes which were subsequently treated as "no crimes" were 26 for the period 1st April 2007 to 31st March 2008. There were no "no crimes" recorded for rapes reported from 1st April 2008 to 30th April 2008.

We have included data for the 2007/2008 reporting year and for April 2008 as your request asked for information for the period April 2007 to April 2008.

Questions 3 and 4

The data we have available is March 2007 to March 2008. This is combined Police and CPS data which is produced by the Home Office.

Summary of key data

  Rate of rape offences Number of offences % number of offences % resulting in a sanction detection Number of prosections % discontinuanced by CPS (1) Of those that go to trial, % resulting in conviction
12 months to March 07 0.17 170 20.9% 29.4% 49 8.2% 77.8%
12 months to March 08 0.14 149 15.0% 30.0% 36 16.7% 55.6%
Difference 0.03 21 5.9% 0.6% 13 8.5% 22.2%

Comparison (12 months to March 2008)

  Rate of rape offences Number of offences % number of offences % resulting in a sanction detection Number of prosections % discontinuanced by CPS (1) Of those that go to trial, % resulting in conviction
National average 2008 0.24   14% 26%   22.7% 57.7%
MSF average 0.21   21% 24%      
Cheshire 0.14   15% 30%   16.7% 55.6%

Question 5

None to date. Cheshire has 18 trained STOs but they are not currently used from start to finish within Cheshire procedures.

Back to Category List