BYU researcher examines why Utah has high numbers of sexual assaults

SALT LAKE CITY, Utah — About two-thirds of the reported sexual assault instances in Utah by no means make it to prosecution in accordance with a research the Utah Ladies and Management Challenge launched not too long ago.

Utah stays on the high of the checklist in relation to the variety of sexual assaults. The state has been there for the previous thirty years.

The research is predicated on information from a number of years of rape kits. Who’s submitting them and why?

“We checked out vulnerabilities for sexual assault. Who in our neighborhood are extra weak for sexual assault,” stated Physician Julie Valentine, at Brigham Younger College. She led the research with the assistance of the Utah Ladies and Management Challenge, based mostly at Utah State College.

“We discovered that ladies of colour, particularly black girls and Native American girls have been extra extremely represented,” she stated.

The information helped the researchers take a better take a look at who’s extra more likely to be focused. It discovered that ladies with psychological sickness rank increased too.

Valentine stated, “When you concentrate on that, a perpetrator goes to focus on some who’s extra weak, somebody with nervousness or despair who might not be engaged with a gaggle, however extra on the fringes – is extra weak for sexual assault.”

On a extra constructive notice, Valentine stated the variety of instances with submitted rape kits is approach as much as 98 %. It was 20 % a decade in the past, although there’s a extra regarding flip-side.

“What number of of those regulation enforcement screened with the prosecutors? And we discovered it’s solely a few third,” she stated.

Valentine stated the explanations fluctuate, together with survivors who resolve they don’t wish to transfer ahead partially as a result of perpetrators are often somebody they know.

“And the betrayal that they really feel, they actually need help to undergo this course of,” she defined.

She added that with a view to see extra instances prosecuted, we’d like extra sources for survivors and regulation enforcement.

“We create a tradition the place victims really feel snug coming ahead and reporting after which we offer companies,” she stated.

Along with sending the message you could’t get away with it right here, Valentine stated by way of prosecution, offenders can get efficient remedies and counseling which may help stop re-offending sooner or later.