translated from Spanish: In 2019, the rate of sexual offences rose by almost 30 percent

An annual report by the National Criminal Information System presented in recent hours by Security Minister Sabina Frederic found that the rate of sexual offences across the country increased during 2019 by almost 30% compared to the previous year. In addition, he confirmed that most of these cases had a woman as a victim. The document notes that there were 1,765,932 criminal acts recorded across the country (a rate of 3,929.6 cases per 100 thousand inhabitants), equivalent to growth of 12.6% compared to 2018.In addition, the sexual integrity crime victims rate increased by 28.9 percent between 2018 and 2019, from a rate of 38.2 victims per 100,000 inhabitants in 2018 to 49.2 in 2019.” The evolution of the rate per 100,000 inhabitants of rape victims (sexual abuse with carnal access) and the rate of victims of other crimes against sexual integrity, had significant increases between 2018 and 2019,” the report states. “By their characteristics, these crimes have a high level of under-registration, due to the stigmatization processes suffered by victims. Changes in social perception of sexual violence, as well as institutional responses and state policies, impact on reporting levels, so knowing the prevalence and historical evolution of these crimes requires supplementing information from administrative records, with victimization surveys indicating the level of non-reporting,” he says. For her part, Minister Frederic explained: “One of the contributions of this report is that it includes information on the sex of victims of some crimes against people and against sexual integrity that were not published in previous editions and that now improves the possibility of making more accurate diagnoses for serious and viable public policies.” In the case of gender-based violence, information from the SNIC contributes to the work of the interministerial table against extreme gender-based violence that we developed together with the Ministry of Women, Gender and Diversity and the Ministry of Justice,” she added. The presentation of the report also featured the National Director of Criminal Statistics, Angela Oyhandy, who noted, among others, that the 1,765,932 reported criminal acts marked an increase of 12.6% compared to those recorded in 2018.

Original source in Spanish