Tuesday, April 26, 2005

SPOTLIGHT: Crime against children

Sexual assault: Youth most at risk

SIX OUT of 10 sexual assaults in Canada are committed against young people aged 17 and under even though they comprise only about one-fifth of the population, according to a new report.

The report found that sexual assaults are largely crimes committed against children and young people.

Children in this age group represent just 22% of the population. But of the 15,000 sexual assaults reported by police, 61% of victims were aged 17 and under. About four-fifths of these victims were girls, and more than two-thirds of these girls were aged between 11 and 17.

Younger victims were more likely to be sexually assaulted by a family member.  Almost half of victims aged six and under were sexually assaulted by a family member, while this was the case for about 44% of female victims aged six to 10.

Strangers were implicated in only 5% of the reported sexual assaults against children.  The majority of these instances involved older teenagers.

As the age of the victim increased, the proportion of sexual assaults occurring in a private dwelling declined, while the proportion occurring outside a home went up.  Police statistics show that about one in 10 sexual assaults against children aged 11 to 13 occurred in a school.

Police services

The report studied data from 122 police services, representing 61% of the national volume of crime. As such, the data are not nationally representative.

One-fifth of all violent crimes in Canada as reported to police in 2003 were committed against children aged 17 and under. They were victims of 21% of physical assaults and 17% of other crimes involving violence or the threat of violence.

These violent crimes include sexual and physical assaults as well as other incidents involving violence or the threat of violence such as robbery, uttering threats and criminal harassment.

In 2003, just under 28,000 physical assaults against children aged 17 and under were reported to police in this study. More than three-quarters consisted of common assault.

Homicide data

The report also found that between 1998 and 2003, 401 children aged 17 and under were victims of homicide. Two-thirds of the 350 solved homicides against those young people were committed by a family member.

Over half of those were committed by the victim's father. About 32% of those cases involved the victim's mother and 9% involved other family members.

Victims under the age of six were usually killed by some form of physical force, such as strangulation, beatings or a forceful shaking. The motive most often reported in homicides of young children was frustration.

You can read the full report “Juristat: Children and youth as victims of violent crime” on our website.

For more information, contact Information and Client Services (1-800-387-2231), Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics.

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© 2004, 2005 Statistics Canada.