More than half of sexual assault victims last year were children

More than half of people who came forward as victims of sexual assault last year were under 18, the latest figures from the Central Statistics Office (CSO) show.

Fifty-six per cent of victims of sexual violence were under 18 and 82 per cent were female, it said.

It also found nearly one in four victims of sexual violence who came forward last year were reporting crimes that occurred more than a decade ago, a similar proportion to previous years.

Fifty-eight per cent of victims report sexual offending that had taken place in the past year.

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Homicide victims, including victims of murder, manslaughter and dangerous driving causing death, were mostly male (69 per cent). Men also accounted for 56 per cent of victims of physical assault and similar offences.

However, the proportion of female victims of homicide and assault has been rising in recent years. In 2019, just 21.5 per cent of homicide victims were women. The figures for 2020 and 2021 were 33.8 per cent and 30.8 per cent respectively.

Dangerous driving

Forty-nine per cent of homicide victims were 45 or older and 10 per cent were under 18. Twenty-three per cent were aged 18-29.

Forty per cent of victims of dangerous driving causing death were aged 18-44. A third were aged 45-59, and 13 per cent were under 18.

The CSO also released statistics profiling the suspected perpetrators of crimes reported in 2020. These showed that sexual violence suspects were overwhelmingly men (98 per cent).

Seventeen per cent of sexual offenders were aged under 18 and in a seventh of cases both the suspect and victim were under 18.

Men made up 89 per cent of homicide suspects and 80 per cent of suspects in attempted murder, assault and harassment investigations.

The CSO figures continue to be released with an “under reservation” warning due to concerns about the quality of data provided by the Garda.