In the 12 months to April 2004 10,100 adult women were sexually or indecently assaulted in New South Wales.¹

In the 12 months to December 2003, NSW Police recorded 2707 adult female victims of sexual or indecent assault.²

Thus the percentage of sexual and indecent assaults reported to police in 2003 was between 20 and 27 per cent.

In 2003, 604 persons appeared before the Local or Higher Criminal Courts charged with a sexual or indecent assault offence that did not involve children.³

Of these 604 people, 278 were found guilty of at least one sexual offence.

Thus the percentage of persons appearing in court for a sexual assault charge who are convicted was 46 per cent in 2003.

In 2003 there were 858 individual charges finalised in the Local or Higher Criminal Courts for sexual assault (excluding charges for sexual offences against children). Of these 858 charges, 361 were proven.⁴ Accordingly, the percentage of sexual assault charges that were proven was 42 per cent.

Because the number of offenders is not known, it is not possible to compute the percentage of people who commit a sexual assault who end up apprehended by police or convicted in court

The percentage cannot be reliably determined from the ratio of persons convicted of sexual assault to persons who become victims of sexual assault because the number of offenders is likely to be considerably smaller than the number of victims.

It is true to say, however, that the number of proven sexual assault charges is less than five percent of the total number of sexual assault victims.

Source: NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research, December 2004.
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