Bureau of Justice Statistics

Sexual Assault of Young

Children as Reported to Law

Enforcement: Victim, Incident,

and Offender Characteristics

U.S. Department of Justice

Office of Justice Programs

A NIBRS Statistical Report
 

Sexual Assault of

Young Children as

Reported to Law

Enforcement: 

Victim, Incident, 

and Offender

Characteristics

by Howard N. Snyder, Ph.D.

National Center for Juvenile Justice

July 2000, NCJ 182990

A Statistical Report 

using data from the National 

Incident-Based Reporting System

This work was supported in part by a grant from

the American Statistical Association with funds

provided by the U.S. Department of Justice, 

Bureau of Justice Statistics.
ii Sexual Assault of Young Children as Reported to Law Enforcement

Acknowledgments

I would like to acknowledge the technical

support given to this effort by the Criminal Justice Information Services Division

of the Federal Bureau of Investigation

and the financial support provided by a

grant from the American Statistical

Association.

Contents

Introduction .......................................................................1

The data ..........................................................................1

Findings ............................................................................2

Age of the victims of sexual assault ...................2

Gender of sexual assault victims .........................4

Other offenses in sexual assault incidents .........5

Other victims in sexual assault incidents ............5

Location of sexual assault ..................................6

Weapons in sexual assault .................................6

Time of day of sexual assault .............................7

Gender and age of offenders in sexual assault ..8

Victim-offender relationships in sexual assault ..10

Offender profiling ..............................................10

Probability of arrest and clearance ...................11

Correlates of the probability of arrest ...............12

Summary and conclusions ............................................12

NIBRS definitions of forcible sex offenses .....................13

Appendix A ....................................................................14

Bibliography ...................................................................14
Introduction

To law enforcement and the public, sexual assaults, and

especially the sexual assaults of young children, are a major

social concern. Caretakers worry about such attacks when

their children are out of sight. Law enforcement, child

protective services, and legislatures work to reduce the

incidence of these crimes. However, while a few highly

publicized incidents are engraved in the public’s

consciousness, there is little empirically-based information

on these crimes. Until recently, law enforcement and

policymakers had few hard facts on which to base their

response to these crimes, their victims, and their offenders. 

The only existing national data collection effort that explored

the incidence of sexual assault ignored crimes against

young victims. The National Crime Victimization Survey

(NCVS) estimated there were 197,000 incidents of forcible

rape and 110,000 incidents of other sexual assault in the

United States in 1996 involving victims ages 12 or above

(Ringel, 1997). Victims reported that a third (31%) of these

sexual assaults (or 94,000 victimizations) were reported to

law enforcement agencies. However, for 1996, the Uniform

Crime Reporting Program (UCR) estimated that there were

96,000 forcible rapes alone reported to law enforcement

agencies (FBI, 1997). The UCR does not capture reported

crime information on other sexual assaults such as forcible

sodomy, sexual assault with an object, and forcible fondling.

However, it can be assumed from their relative volume in the

NCVS that tens of thousands of sexual assaults other than

forcible rape came to the attention of law enforcement in

1996. The large difference between the NCVS and the UCR

estimates may reflect differences in the two data collection

methods; or, if both estimates are valid, they indicate that

many victims of sexual assault are youth under age 12. 

Beyond their volume, little is known about the victims, 

their offenders, and other characteristics of these crimes.

However, the UCR’s relatively new National Incident-Based

Reporting System (NIBRS) has the potential to yield detailed

descriptions of sexual assaults reported by participating law

enforcement agencies. NIBRS captures a wide range of

information on each incident of sexual assault reported to

law enforcement. This information includes demographic

information on all victims; the levels of victim injury; victims’

perceptions of offenders’ ages, gender, race, and Hispanic

ethnicity; and the victim-offender relationships. NIBRS also

collects information on all offenses involved in the incident;

the types of weapons used; the locations of the incident, the

dates and times of the incident; the demographics of

arrestees (if any); and the methods of clearance, such as 

arrest or victim refusal to cooperate with the investigation.

To some, the value of the NIBRS data is limited by the small

and non-scientific sample of contributing law enforcement

agencies. From 1991 through 1996 the sample of reporting

agencies increased; however, even the reporting agencies

in the 1996 sample were responsible for less than 10% of

the U.S. population. While there is no way to assess the

national representativeness of the sample, the number of

sexual assault victimizations in the NIBRS sample is very

large. Therefore, accepting the inherent qualifications

associated with any analysis of NIBRS data, the sheer

number of reports and the detailed information available on

each crime provides researchers and policymakers with a

unique opportunity to study the sexual assaults of young

children.

The data

The 1991 through 1996 NIBRS master files contain reports

from law enforcement agencies in 12 States: Alabama,

Colorado, Idaho, Illinois, Iowa, Massachusetts, Michigan,

North Dakota, South Carolina, Utah, Vermont, and Virginia.

These reports were scanned to identify incidents of sexual

assault. The FBI’s offense coding structure classifies sexual

assault into four separate offense categories. From most to

least serious, these crimes are forcible rape, forcible

sodomy, sexual assault with an object, and forcible fondling.

If more than one of these offenses occurred, the most

severe sexual charge was used to classify the sexual

assault in the incident.

To study the sexual assault of young children, two research

bases (differing by unit of count) were extracted from the

1991 through 1996 NIBRS master files. One base summarized the information for each of the 60,991 victims of sexual

assault, the incident characteristics, and (where available)

information on their offender(s). The second base compiled

information for each of the 57,762 victim-identified offenders

in sexual assault incidents, their victims, and related incident

characteristics.

Victim, Incident, and Offender Characteristics 1
Findings

Age of the victims of sexual assault

The most serious sexual assault charge was forcible

fondling in 45% of all sexual assaults reported to law

enforcement in the 1991 through 1996 NIBRS master files.

Incidents of forcible rape were nearly as common (42%),

while incidents of forcible sodomy (8%) and sexual assault

with an object (4%) were far less frequent. One percent of

victims of these crimes was age 54 or older. Seven percent

of victims were over age 34 (table 1). Another 12% were

ages 25 through 34, and 14% were between ages 18 and

24. The remainder, over two-thirds (67%) of all victims of

sexual assault reported to law enforcement agencies, were

juveniles (under the age of 18 at the time of the crime).

More than half of all juvenile victims were under age 12.

That is, 33% of all victims of sexual assault reported to law

enforcement were ages 12 through 17 and 34% were under

age 12.1

 Most disturbing is that one of every seven victims

of sexual assault (or 14% of all victims) reported to law

enforcement agencies were under age 6.

The age profile of sexual assault victims varied with the

nature of the crime. Juveniles were the large majority of the

victims of forcible fondling (84%), forcible sodomy (79%),

and sexual assault with an object (75%). In contrast,

juveniles were the victims in less than half (46%) of forcible

rapes. In each sexual assault category except forcible rape,

children below the age of 12 were about half of all victims.

The detailed age distribution of the victims of sexual assault

emphasizes the high proportion of juvenile victims. The

single age with the greatest proportion of sexual assault

victims reported to law enforcement was age 14 (figure 1).

There were more victims in each individual age group

between 3 and 17 than in any individual age group over age

17 (any adult age group), and more victims age 2 than in

any age group above age 40. For victims under age 12,

4-year-olds were at greatest risk of being the victim of a

sexual assault.

The victim age distribution differed with the nature of the

offense (figure 2). The risk of being the victim of forcible

rape increased dramatically from age 10 to age 14, where it

peaked. By age 20, the risk had dropped to less than half

the peak 14-year-old rate, and dropped to a 10th of the

14-year-old peak by age 40. For the other types of sexual

assault, the victim age curves had two peaks, one (as in

forcible rape) around age 13 or 14 and the other around age

4. The risk of being the victim of forcible sodomy peaked at

age 4. By age 11 the risk of forcible sodomy dropped to half

the peak rate, then increased for a couple of years through

age 13, before falling to a 10th of the peak rate by the early

20s. The risk of being the victim of sexual assault with an

object peaked at ages 3 and 4, then fell to less than half the

peak rate by age 8. After age 8 the risk of sexual assault

with an object increased through age 14 to almost

three-fourths the 3- and 4-year-old peak, and then dropped

to a 10th of the peak rate by the mid-20s. The risk of

forcible fondling, the other high volume sex assault offense

along with forcible rape, first peaked at age 4, dropped

marginally through the pre-teen years, and then increased to

its absolute peak for victims age 13. After age 13, the risk of

forcible fondling dropped precipitously, so that by age 24 the

risk was a 10th of that of 13-year-olds.

2 Sexual Assault of Young Children as Reported to Law Enforcement 

1

This finding that a third of sexual assault victims reported to law

enforcement were under age 12 largely accounts for the discrepancy

between the NCVS and the UCR estimates of the number of sexual

assaults reported to law enforcement.

Figure 1

5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

Age of victim

Rate per 1,000 victims

Age distribution of victims of sexual assault

Above 34 7.4 12.0 5.1 6.8 3.5

25 to 34 11.5 19.6 7.5 8.3 5.0

18 to 24 14.2 22.6 8.7 9.7 7.7

12 to 17 32.8 33.5 24.0 25.5 34.3

6 to 11 20.1 8.0 30.8 23.2 29.3

0 to 5 14.0% 4.3% 24.0% 26.5% 20.2%

Total 100.0% 100.0% 100.0% 100.0% 100.0%

Forcible

fondling

Sexual assault

with object

Forcible

sodomy

Forcible

rape

All sexual

Victim age assault

Table 1. Age profile of the victims of sexual assault
Victim, Incident, and Offender Characteristics 3

5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

Age of victim

5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

Age of victim

5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

Age of victim

5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

Age of victim

Rate per 1,000 victims Rate per 1,000 victims

Rate per 1,000 victims Rate per 1,000 victims

Forcible rape Forcible sodomy

Sexual assault with an object Forcible fondling

Age profiles of sexual assault victims, by offense catagory

Figure 2
Gender of sexual assault victims

Females were more than six times as likely as males to be

the victims of sexual assaults known to law enforcement

agencies. More specifically, 86% of all victims of sexual

assault were female. The relative proportion of female

victims generally increased with age. Sixty-nine percent of

victims under age 6 were female, compared with 73% of

victims under age 12, and 82% of all juvenile (under age 18)

victims. The female proportion of sexual assault victims

reached 90% at age 13 and 95% at age 19 (figure 3).

Nearly all forcible rapes (99%) involved a female victim

(table 2).2

 Females were the large majority of victims in

incidents of sexual assault with an object (87%) and forcible

fondling (82%). In contrast, the majority of victims of forcible

sodomy (54%) were males. In general, across all specific

offense categories, the proportion of female victims

increased with the age of the victim. A greater percentage

of juvenile sexual assault victims were male (18%) than

were adult sexual assault victims (4%). Males were 15% of

the juvenile victims of sexual assault with an object, 20% of

the juvenile victims of forcible fondling, and 59% of the

juvenile victims of forcible sodomy. For victims under age

12, the male proportions were even greater: sexual assault

with an object (19%), forcible fondling (26%), and forcible

sodomy (64%). 

Based on the NIBRS data, the year in a male’s life when he

is most likely to be the victim of a sexual assault is age 4

(figure 4). By age 17 his risk of victimization has been cut

by a factor of 5. A female’s year of greatest risk is age 14.

Her risk drops to half the peak level by age 17 and to a fifth

of the peak level by age 27. At his peak victimization age of

4, a male’s risk of sexual assault victimization is just half that

of females of the same age. In the later juvenile years (ages

14 to 17), the female victimization rates are at least 10 times

greater than the male rates for similar age groups.

4 Sexual Assault of Young Children as Reported to Law Enforcement 

2

Males can be victims of a forcible rape when the perpetrator is a female. 

Figure 4

5 10 15 20 25 30

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

Age of victim

Rate per 1,000 victims

Male

Age distribution of sexual assault victims, by gender

Female

Percent of sexual assault victims

Female proportion of all sexual assault victims

5 10 15 20 25 30

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

Age of victim

Female

Above 34 95.3 99.3 68.4 89.5 90.5

25 to 34 96.1 99.4 67.5 94.7 91.9

18 to 24 95.4 99.5 55.5 97.1 91.7

12 to 17 90.9 98.5 51.1 92.3 88.8

6 to 11 74.9 97.1 36.1 83.2 76.0

0 to 5 69.4 93.7 36.7 80.0 70.3

All ages 86.2% 98.7% 45.5% 87.4% 81.8%

Forcible

fondling

Sexual assault

with object

Forcible

sodomy

Forcible 

rape

All sexual

Victim age assaults

Table 2. Female proportion of sexual assault victims

Figure 3
Other offenses in sexual assault incidents

In 92% of sexual assault victimizations, a single sexual

assault was the only crime against the victim recorded for

the offender. Crimes against adults were more likely to

involve multiple charges than were crimes against juveniles.

That is, law enforcement recorded that 16% of all adult

sexual assault victims also experienced another offense in

the incident, compared with 5% of juvenile victims. Overall,

female victims of sexual assault were more likely to

experience multiple offenses than were male victims (10%

versus 4%). This gender difference was far less for juvenile

victims; 5% of female juvenile victims experienced multiple

offenses compare with 3% of male juvenile victims. When

juvenile victims experienced multiple offenses, the most

serious other charge in 47% of the incidents was another

sex offense, 21% involved a non-sexual assault, 17% a

kidnaping, and in 8% a burglary. When adult victims

experienced multiple offenses, in 13% of the incidents the

most serious other charge was another sex offense, in 20%

a non-sexual assault, in 30% a kidnaping, in 10% a robbery,

and in 21% a burglary.

Other victims in sexual assault incidents

When adults were sexually assaulted, the adult was the only

victim in the incident in the vast majority of victimizations

(96%). Juvenile victimizations were far more likely to

include other victims. In 19% of juvenile sexual assault

victimizations, the juvenile was victimized along with another

individual. Thirteen percent of juvenile victimizations

involved a second victim; the remaining 6% involved three or

more victims (not necessarily victims of sexual assault).

Younger juvenile victims were more likely than older juvenile

victims to be sexually assaulted with other victims. The

proportion of youth victimized with others was greater for

juvenile victims under age 12 (25%) than for older juveniles

(13%). However, within the younger juvenile group, this

age-related pattern was reversed; that is, youth ages 6

through 11 were more likely to be victimized with others than

were youth under age 6. Twenty-one percent of victims

under age 6 were victimized with others compared to 28% of

victims ages 6 through 11.

Forcible rapes were more likely to involve a single victim

than any other sexual assault. In 94% of forcible rape

victimizations, there were no other victims involved, 

compared with 79% of forcible fondling, 81% of forcible

sodomy, and 85% of victimizations of sexual assault with an

object (table 3). Within each type of sexual assault, juvenile

victims were more likely to be victimized with others than

were adults. Regardless of the nature of the sexual assault,

juveniles under age 12 were more likely than older juveniles

to be victimized with others. But, as in the overall pattern,

within each detailed offense category, youth ages 6 through

11 were more likely to be victimized with others than were

the youngest victims, under age 6. 

Females were more likely to be victimized alone than were

males. In 96% of adult female sexual assault victimizations,

the female was the only victim, compared with 88% of adult

male victimizations. This discrepancy held for juvenile

victims; in 83% of juvenile female sexual assault victimizations, the female was the only victim, compared with 71% of

male victimizations. This discrepancy also held for victims

under age 12; females under age 12 were the lone victims in

77% of their sexual assaults compared with 69% of young

males. Similar gender differences were found in each

specific sexual assault offense category.

When there was more than one victim in the incident, the

victims were likely to be of similar ages. This relationship

was stronger for juvenile victims than adult victims. In adult

victimizations involving more than one victim, 71% percent

of the victimizations involved another adult and 35%

involved a juvenile victim, with 6% involving both another

adult and a juvenile victim. However, in juvenile

victimizations with more than one victim, 96% percent of the

victimizations involved another juvenile and 6% involved an

adult victim, with 2% involving both another juvenile and an

adult victim. For victims under age 12 who were victimized

with others, 90% of victimizations involved another youth

under age 12, 15% involved older juveniles, and 4%

involved adult victims.

Victim, Incident, and Offender Characteristics 5

Above 34 95.1 97.9 96.8 93.0 90.4

25 to 34 96.8 97.9 93.7 97.1 93.6

18 to 24 95.1 97.1 93.9 94.6 89.8

12 to 17 86.9 93.7 83.6 87.9 81.0

6 to 11 72.2 81.0 72.5 72.8 69.9

0 to 5 79.0 86.7 77.9 84.8 77.0

All ages 85.8% 94.5% 81.1% 85.3% 78.6%

Forcible

fondling

Sexual assault

with object

Forcible

sodomy

Forcible 

rape

All sexual

Victim age assaults

Table 3. Proportion of sexual assault victims

victimized alone
Location of sexual assault

Most (70%) of the sexual assaults reported to law

enforcement occurred in the residence of the victim, the

offender, or the residence of another individual. Less than

two-thirds of forcible rapes (64%) occur in a residence

compared with three-quarters of other sexual assaults:

forcible sodomy (74%), sexual assault with an object (76%),

and forcible fondling (74%). Sexual assaults against

females were less likely to occur in a residence than were

those against male victims (69% versus 77%). 

Young victims were generally more likely to be victimized in

a residence than were older victims (table 4). The age of

the victim was strongly related to where the assault

occurred. Seventy-seven percent of sexual assaults with

juvenile victims occurred in a residence compared with 55%

of adult victimizations. Older juveniles were more likely than

younger juveniles to be victimized in a location other than a

residence. While just 16% of the sexual assaults of youth

below the age of 12 occurred in a place other than a

residence, 31% of the victimizations of youth ages 12

through 17 occurred in such locations. The most common

non-resident locations for sexual assaults of juveniles were

roadways, fields/woods, schools, and hotels/motels. For

adults the most likely locations after a residence included

roadways, fields/woods, hotels/motels, parking lots, and

commercial/office buildings.

When a juvenile female was the victim of a sexual assault,

the incident was almost as likely to occur in a residence as

when a juvenile male was the victim. Seventy-six percent of

juvenile female victims of sexual assault were victimized in

their home or in another residence compared with 80% of

juvenile male victims. The proportion of victimizations that

occurred in residences was also similar for female and male

victims under age 12 (85% versus 83%) and for female and

male victims ages 12 through 17 (69% versus 72%).

Weapons in sexual assault

In 93% of sexual assault victimizations the NIBRS data

provided information on the most serious weapon used in

the incident. In 77% of sexual assaults where the weapon

information was available, the only weapon involved was

what the FBI label as a personal weapon such as hands,

feet, or fists. A firearm was used or brandished in just 2% of

sexual assault victimizations. Other non-personal weapons

such as a knife or club, were used or brandished in another

6% of sexual assaults. In 14% of victimizations the records

indicate that no weapon was involved. 

The use of a weapon other than a personal weapon

increased with the age of the victim. Rarely did the sexual

assaults of youth under age 12 involve a firearm. A firearm

was involved in just 1% of the sexual assaults of youth ages

12 through 17. Other non-personal weapons were more

common in these crimes, being involved in 4% of crimes

against both juveniles under age 12 and victims between

ages 12 and 17. For adult victims, firearms were a slightly

more common attribute of sexual assault, being used in 5%

of victimizations. Other non-personal weapons were more

common in adult, rather than in juvenile assaults, being used

in 11% of the sexual assaults of persons ages 18 and over.

6 Sexual Assault of Young Children as Reported to Law Enforcement 

*** indicates fewer than 100 victimizations

Above 34 54.3 *** *** *** ***

25 to 34 52.4 *** 53.8 *** 46.8

18 to 24 48.5 *** 48.1 *** 50.0

12 to 17 71.6 81.6 69.0 *** 71.5

6 to 11 80.5 *** 79.0 *** 81.2

0 to 5 85.0 *** 84.2 83.3 85.5

Males 76.8% 76.6% 74.0% 76.8% 78.4%

Above 34 60.2 62.1 59.8 63.4 52.8

25 to 34 53.0 53.4 48.6 59.2 51.3

18 to 24 55.5 57.0 56.8 58.8 50.5

12 to 17 69.0 68.5 76.4 75.6 68.5

6 to 11 83.3 83.4 85.9 86.0 82.8

0 to 5 87.5 86.5 86.1 87.3 88.0

Females 68.7% 64.0% 74.2% 76.6% 72.7%

Above 34 59.8 62.1 54.2 61.4 53.7

25 to 34 53.0 53.4 50.4 58.7 51.0

18 to 24 55.1 56.9 52.9 57.4 50.4

12 to 17 69.2 68.7 72.7 75.3 68.8

6 to 11 82.6 83.3 81.5 84.5 82.4

0 to 5 86.7 86.4 84.9 86.1 87.2

All victims 69.8% 64.2% 74.0% 76.2% 73.7%

Forcible

fondling

Sexual assault

with object

Forcible

sodomy

Forcible 

rape

All sexual

Victim age assaults

Table 4. Percent of sexual assault occurring

within a residence
Time of day of sexual assault

The time of day when sexual assaults occurred was related

primarily to the age of the victim (figure 5). For adult victims,

sexual assaults were most common between midnight and 2

a.m. From morning through 7 p.m. the number of adult

sexual assaults committed in each 1-hour period was

essentially constant. The number of adult assaults began to

increase in the 8 p.m. hour and increased consistently until

the peak in the 2 a.m. hour.3

The temporal pattern for the sexual assaults of very young

victims, children under age 6, was quite different. For these

young victims, the temporal distribution appears to be a

combination of two separate distributions. The primary

temporal pattern for these crimes has a peak in the 3 p.m. 

hour. This is also the hour other research has found to be

the period when juveniles are most likely to be the victims of

violent crime in general (Snyder and Sickmund, 1999). This

primary temporal pattern shows a consistent increase in the

frequency of sexual assaults of very young victims before 3

p.m. and a consistent decline in the hours after 3 p.m. The

secondary temporal pattern for the sexual assaults of very

young children shows the hours of 8 a.m., noon, and 6 p.m.

(traditional meal times) to be periods when the number of

sexual assaults of very young victims spike. The temporal

patterns of sexual assault of youth ages 6 through 11, and

juveniles ages 12 through 17, appear to be a combination of

the patterns of the very young, and the adult victims. These

temporal distributions combine the after-school and

mealtime hour patterns of very young victims and the

temporal patterns of sexual assault for adults.

Victim, Incident, and Offender Characteristics 7

6 a.m. 9 a.m. noon 3 p.m. 6 p.m. 9 p.m.12 a.m.3 a.m. 6 a.m.

0%

1%

2%

3%

4%

5%

6%

7%

8%

9%

Time of incident

Percent of all victimizations

Victims under age 6

6 a.m. 9 a.m. noon 3 p.m. 6 p.m. 9 p.m.12 a.m.3 a.m. 6 a.m.

0%

1%

2%

3%

4%

5%

6%

7%

8%

9%

Time of incident

Percent of all victimizations

Victims ages 6 through 11

Temporal distribution of sexual assault within victim age categories

6 a.m. 9 a.m. noon 3 p.m. 6 p.m. 9 p.m.12 a.m.3 a.m. 6 a.m.

0%

1%

2%

3%

4%

5%

6%

7%

Time of incident

Percent of all victimizations

Victims ages 12 through 17

6 a.m. 9 a.m. noon 3 p.m. 6 p.m. 9 p.m.12 a.m.3 a.m. 6 a.m.

0%

1%

2%

3%

4%

5%

6%

7%

8%

9%

Time of incident

Percent of all victimizations

Victims ages 18 and over

Figure 5

3

The time of incident information in NIBRS is truncated to the hour, so that

a crime that occurred at 2:45 a.m. is coded as a 2 a.m. crime.
Gender and age of offenders in sexual assault

Nearly all of the offenders in sexual assaults reported to law

enforcement were male (96%). Female offenders were

most common in assaults against victims under age 6. For

these youngest victims, 12% of offenders were females,

compared with 6% for victims ages 6 through 12, and 3% for

victims ages 12 through 17. Overall, 6% of the offenders

who sexually assaulted juveniles were female, compared

with just 1% of the female offenders who sexually assaulted

adults.

The age profile of offenders in sexual assault varied with the

nature of the crime (table 5). Overall, 23% of sexual assault

offenders were under age 18 and 77% were adults.

Juveniles were a substantially smaller proportion of the

offenders in forcible rapes (17%) than in sexual assaults

with an object (23%), forcible fondlings (27%), and incidents

of forcible sodomy (36%).

Sixteen percent of juvenile offenders were under the age of

12. These very young offenders were seldom the offenders

in forcible rapes (1% of all offenders and 7% of juvenile

offenders), while they made up greater proportions of the

juvenile offenders in forcible fondlings (19%), sexual

assaults with an object (17%), and forcible sodomies (23%).

Young adults (persons 18 through 24) were 22% of adult

offenders in forcible fondlings; however, they were 35% of

adult offenders in forcible rapes. Correspondingly, adults

over age 34 were 28% of all adult offenders in forcible rapes

and 47% of the adult offenders in forcible fondlings.

In general, the detailed age profile of offenders in sexual

assault crimes shows that the single age with the greatest

number of offenders from the perspective of law enforcement was age 14 (figure 6).4

 The frequency of offenders

within age groups declined gradually with age, reaching

half the peak frequency by the late 30s.

The age profile of offenders varied with the age of the victim

(figure 7). Juvenile offenders assaulted 4% of adult victims,

while adult offenders assaulted 67% of juvenile victims.

Younger juvenile victims tended to have a greater proportion

of juvenile offenders than did older juvenile victims. Thirteen

percent of offenders of victims under age 6 were ages 7

through 11, and 27% of the offenders of these very young

victims were ages 12 through 17. That is, 40% of the

offenders of victims under age 6 were themselves juveniles.

A similar proportion (39%) of offenders of victims ages 6

through 11 were also juveniles. For older juvenile victims,

the proportion of juvenile offenders dropped to 27%.

8 Sexual Assault of Young Children as Reported to Law Enforcement 

4

Analyses of the NIBRS data on age of offender is complicated by the fact

that the distribution of ages is greatly affected by the use of age estimates

by the victims. See Appendix A for more details. 

Above 34 28.4 23.4 24.2 32.2 34.1

25 to 34 26.7 30.6 24.3 27.1 23.1

18 to 24 21.7 29.1 15.2 17.3 15.8

Adults 76.8% 83.0% 63.8% 76.6% 73.0%

12 to 17 19.5 15.7 28.1 19.3 21.8

7 to 11 3.6 1.3 8.2 4.1 5.2

Juveniles 23.2% 17.0% 36.2% 23.4% 27.0%

Total 100.0% 100.0% 100.0% 100.0% 100.0%

Forcible

fondling

Sexual assault

with object

Forcible

sodomy

Forcible 

rape

All sexual

assaults

Offender

age

Table 5. Age profile of sexual assault offenders

5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

Age of victim

Rate per 1,000 offenders

Age profile of sexual assault offenders

Figure 6
Victim, Incident, and Offender Characteristics 9

5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

Age of offender

5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

Age of offender

Rate per 1,000 victims Rate per 1,000 victims

Victims under age 6 Victims ages 6 through 11

Rate per 1,000 victims Rate per 1,000 victims

5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

Age of offender

5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

Age of offender

Victims ages 12 through 17 Victims ages 18 and over

Age profiles of sexual assault offenders within victim age categories

Figure 7
Victim-offender relationships in sexual assault

About one-quarter (27%) of all offenders were family

members of their victims (table 6). The offenders of young

victims were more likely than the offenders of older victims

to be family members. Almost half (49%) of the offenders

of victims under age 6 were family members, compared with

42% of the offenders who sexually assaulted youth ages 6

through 11, and 24% of offenders who sexually assaulted

juveniles ages 12 through 17. Overall, just 12% of the

offenders who sexually assaulted adults were family

members of the victims, compared with 34% of the

offenders of juvenile victims.

Except for victims under age 6, most sexual assault

offenders were not family members but were otherwise

known to the victim. Sixty percent of all sexual assault

offenders were classified by law enforcement as

acquaintances of the victim. Just 14% of offenders were

strangers to their victims. Strangers were a greater

proportion of the offenders of adult victims (27%) than

juvenile victims (7%). The youngest juveniles were least

likely to have an offender who was a stranger. Just 3% of

the offenders in the sexual assaults of children under age 6

were strangers, compared with 5% of the offenders of youth

ages 6 through 12, and 10% of offenders of juveniles ages

12 through 17.

In general, the victim-offender relationships were similar for

male and female victims; however, there were differences in

the offender profiles for victims under age 12 (table 7).

Compared with young male victims, a greater proportion of

female victims under age 12 was assaulted by family

members. For male victims under age 12, 40% of offenders

were family members compared with 47% of the offenders

of females under age 12. 

Offender profiling

Using NIBRS data, it is possible to develop probability

statements about the characteristics of the offenders given

certain characteristics of the incident (table 8). For example,

knowing that a victim under age 6 was assaulted in a

residence, the NIBRS data indicate that the most likely

offender was a juvenile acquaintance age 12 through 17

(probability 15.2%) or a family member age 25 through 34

(probability 15.0%). When a very young victim was

assaulted some place other than a residence, the probability

that the offender was an adult family member declines, while

the probability that the offender was a juvenile acquaintance

under age 12 increases substantially. When the victim was

a little older (ages 6 through 11) and assaulted in some

place other than a residence, the likelihood that the offender

was a juvenile acquaintance increases even more

(probability 41.0%). 

10 Sexual Assault of Young Children as Reported to Law Enforcement 

Above 24 100.0 11.8 60.3 27.9

18 to 24 100.0 10.7 68.4 20.9

Adults 100.0% 11.3 63.9 24.8

12 to 17 100.0 23.7 68.7 7.6

6 to 11 100.0 37.7 57.7 4.6

0 to 5 100.0 42.4 54.1 3.5

Juveniles 100.0% 35.8 59.2 5.0

Male victims 100.0% 32.8% 59.8% 7.3%

Above 24 100.0 12.9 56.9 30.2

18 to 24 100.0 9.8 66.4 23.8

Adults 100.0% 11.5 61.0 27.5

12 to 17 100.0 24.3 65.7 10.0

6 to 11 100.0 43.8 51.4 4.8

0 to 5 100.0 51.1 45.9 3.0

Juveniles 100.0% 33.9 58.7 7.5

Female victims 100.0% 25.7% 59.5% 14.7%

Victim age Total Family member Acquaintance Stranger

Offenders

Table 7. Victim-offender relationship in sexual assault,

by victim gender

Above 24 100.0 12.8 57.1 30.1

18 to 24 100.0 9.8 66.5 23.7

Adults 100.0% 11.5% 61.1% 27.3%

12 to 17 100.0 24.3 66.0 9.8

6 to 11 100.0 42.4 52.9 4.7

0 to 5 100.0 48.6 48.3 3.1

Juveniles 100.0% 34.2% 58.7% 7.0%

All victims 100.0% 26.7% 59.6% 13.8%

Victim age Total Family member Acquaintance Stranger

Offenders

Table 6. Victim-offender relationship in sexual assault
The offenders of adolescents (victims ages 12 through 17)

were 5 times more likely to be adult family members when

the crime was committed in a residence than when it was

committed elsewhere (table 9). The probability that the

offender was a juvenile age 12 through 17 was twice as

great when the crime occurred outside of a residence. 

For adult victims, the offender profile was also related to 

the location of the crime. Offenders of adult victims were 

3 times more likely to be adult strangers when the crime

occurred outside of a residence than when it occurred

inside a residence. 

Probability of arrest and clearance

The NIBRS data indicate that an arrest was made in 27% 

of all sexual assault victimizations. There were only minor

offense-related differences in arrest probabilities: forcible

rape (25%), forcible sodomy (30%), sexual assault with an

object (28%), and forcible fondling (27%). Crimes were also

cleared by means other than arrest, or what the FBI has

labeled clearances by exceptional means. More specifically,

in 7% of sexual assault victimizations the victim refused to

cooperate. Prosecution was declined in 6% of sexual

assaults, implying that there was insufficient evidence to

charge or convict the offender. In a small proportion of

cases, the offender had died, making arrest impossible.

Overall, in the NIBRS sample, 42% of all sexual assaults

were cleared by law enforcement through arrest or by

exceptional means.5

 

In general, the assaults of juvenile victims were more likely

to result in an arrest (29%) than were adult victimizations

(22%). Assaults against the youngest victims were the

least likely of juvenile victimizations to result in arrest. An

offender was arrested in just 19% of the sexual assaults of

children under age 6, compared to 33% of victims ages 6

through 11, and 32% of victims ages 12 through 17. In all,

arrest probabilities were similar in victimizations of children

under age 6 and of adults, while the probability of arrest was

greater when the victim was between the ages of 6 and 17. 

One factor in the relatively lower arrest probability for crimes

against adult victims can be found in a study of clearances

by other means. When considering both arrest and other

Victim, Incident, and Offender Characteristics 11

Over 34 65 123 41

25 to 34 48 73 27

18 to 24 18 68 17

12 to 17 40 225 37

7 to 11 16 185 15

Offender age Family Acquaintance Stranger

Number of victims ages 6 to 11 assaulted elsewhere

Over 34 167 145 7

25 to 34 127 94 5

18 to 24 37 53 4

12 to 17 129 155 5

7 to 11 20 49 1

Offender age Family Acquaintance Stranger

Number of victims ages 6 to 11 assaulted in a residence

Over 34 80 114 34

25 to 34 107 96 22

18 to 24 54 62 12

12 to 17 50 165 12

7 to 11 23 157 14

Offender age Family Acquaintance Stranger

Number of victims under age 6 assaulted elsewhere

Over 34 133 77 2

25 to 34 150 87 6

18 to 24 80 63 3

12 to 17 123 152 6

7 to 11 43 73 3

Offender age Family Acquaintance Stranger

Number of victims under age 6 assaulted in a residence

Table 8. Offender probabilities in a typical 1,000 cases of

sexual assault against youth under age 12, by offense

locality, offender age, and relationship to victim

Over 34 22 180 98

25 to 34 18 208 169

18 to 24 7 157 107

12 to 17 0 20 14

7 to 11 0 0 0

Offender age Family Acquaintance Stranger

Number of victims ages 18 or above assaulted elsewhere

Over 34 91 231 31

25 to 34 62 252 59

18 to 24 19 180 40

12 to 17 5 23 8

7 to 11 0 0 0

Offender age Family Acquaintance Stranger

Number of victims ages 18 or above assaulted in a residence

Over 34 31 97 37

25 to 34 15 94 50

18 to 24 9 220 57

12 to 17 8 329 45

7 to 11 0 7 0

Offender age Family Acquaintance Stranger

Number of victims ages 12 to 17 assaulted elsewhere

Over 34 180 116 7

25 to 34 79 123 11

18 to 24 35 219 16

12 to 17 30 169 11

7 to 11 1 3 0

Offender age Family Acquaintance Stranger

Number of victims ages 12 to 17 assaulted in a residence

Table 9. Offender probabilities in a typical 1,000 cases of

sexual assault against victims over age 11, by offense

locality, victim-offender age and relationship

5

It should be noted that 41% of forcible rapes in the NIBRS data were

cleared by arrests or exceptional means, a level below the national figure

of 52% reported by the FBI in Crime in the United States 1996.
exceptional means, the probability that adult victimizations

were cleared (39%) was closer to the clearance probabilities

for crimes against victims ages 6 through 11 (45%) and

victims ages 12 through 17 (45%). These clearance

probabilities were more similar than the arrest probabilities

because a much larger proportion of adult crimes were

classified as cleared by law enforcement when the victim

refused to cooperate. However, even when considering all

means of clearances, the youngest victims (under age 6) still

had the smallest proportion of their victimizations cleared by

law enforcement (34%).

The probability that an offender would be arrested or the

matter cleared by arrest or exceptional means was largely

unrelated to the offender’s age (figure 8). The only

age-related difference was for very young offenders. While

the crimes of very young offenders were far less likely to

result in arrest than were those of other offenders, the

proportion of their crimes cleared were similar. The reason

for this pattern is that law enforcement considered many of

these crimes to be cleared because the offender had been

identified, but due to the young age of the offender no arrest

was made.

Correlates of the probability of arrest

While age of the offender was differentially related to the

likelihood of arrest, only for the very young offender, other

incident characteristics were correlated with the probability

of arrest and the probability that the offense would be

otherwise cleared by law enforcement. Based on the results

of a logistic regression, the factors that had the largest

influence on the probability of arrest (in order of their odds

ratios) were —

 the number of victims in the incident — with more than

one victim increasing arrest probabilities

 the number of offenders in the incident — with incidents

with just one offender increasing arrest probabilities

 the age of the victim — with juvenile victims increasing

arrest probabilities

 the sex of the victim — with male victims decreasing

arrest probabilities.

Other incident characteristics that influenced the probability

of arrest to a lesser degree, but still remained statistically

significant were —

 the relationship of the victim and the offender — with

offenders who were strangers decreasing arrest probabilities

 the location of the incident — with incidents occurring

outside of residences decreasing arrest probabilities

 the injury to the victim — with incidents in which the victim

was injured decreasing arrest probabilities.

These correlates were roughly similar for predictions of

clearances with one exception. Incidents with offenders who

were known to the victim were substantially more likely to be

cleared than those in which the offender was a stranger to

the victim. This difference between the arrests and

clearance correlates reflects those incidents in which the

offender is known to the victim but the victim refuses to

cooperate with law enforcement.

Summary and conclusions

Based on NIBRS data, crimes against juvenile victims are

the large majority (67%) of sexual assaults handled by law

enforcement agencies. One of every seven victims was

under the age of 6, and over a third of all sexual assaults

involved a victim who was under the age of 12. This implies

that by design the National Crime Victimization Survey is

missing over a third of all sexual assaults that occur in the

United States each year. The only large, multi-jurisdictional

source of information on these crimes, therefore, is the FBI’s

National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS).

With the more complete view of sexual assault patterns in

the NIBRS data, the characteristics of sexual assaults of

young juveniles can be differentiated from those of older

juveniles and adults. Juvenile victims of sexual assault were

more likely to be male (18%) than were adult victims (4%).

Nearly a quarter (27%) of the victims under age 12 were

male. Juveniles under the age of 12 were about half of all

the victims of forcible sodomy, sexual assault with an object,

and forcible fondling and about an eighth of all victims of

forcible rape reported to law enforcement agencies. 

12 Sexual Assault of Young Children as Reported to Law Enforcement 

5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

Age of offender

Percent of all known offenders

Identified offenders arrested or cleared, by offender age

Crimes cleared

Arrested

Figure 8
Juvenile victims were more likely to be victimized with others

than were adults. One of every five juvenile victims of

sexual assault were victimized in incidents with more than

one victim, while just 4% of adult sexual assault victims were

victimized with others. Juveniles under 12 were far more

likely to be victimized in groups than were older juveniles;

25% of these young juveniles were victimized with others,

compared to 13% of older juvenile victims. When juveniles

under the age of 12 were victimized with others, 90% of

victimizations involved other victims under age 12, 15%

involved older juvenile victims, and 4% also involved adult

victims.

Nearly 5 of every 6 sexual assaults of young juveniles

occurred in a residence. Crimes against older juveniles and,

especially, adult victims were far more likely to occur in other

places. Weapons other than the offender’s hands and feet

were rarely used in the sexual assault of young juveniles.

The temporal pattern of sexual assault shows that unlike

adults, young juveniles are at highest risk of sexual assault

in the hours when meals are served and after school.

Adults were the offenders in 60% of the sexual assaults of

youth under age 12. Rarely were the offenders of young

juvenile victims strangers. Strangers were the offenders in

just 3% of sexual assaults against victims under age 6 and

5% of the sexual assault victimizations of youth ages 6

through 11. Sexual assaults of children under the age of 6

were the least likely of all such crimes to result in arrest or

be otherwise cleared. The NIBRS data indicate that law

enforcement identified the offender in just a third (34%) of

the sexual assaults of children under age 6 and nearly half

(45%) of the victimizations of youth ages 6 through 11.

In all, the characteristics of the large number of sexual

assaults of youth under age 12 differ on significant

dimensions from the sexual assaults of older juveniles and

adult victims. This substantial component of America’s

crime problem has been characterized by subjective

assessments or atypical high profile crimes for too long.

NIBRS data provide policymakers (especially in the

communities where NIBRS-compatible, management

information systems exist) with the information required to

make empirically-based judgments about the scope and

characteristics of sexual crimes against our youngest

citizens. With this critical information, justice professionals

and policymakers can focus their energies on possible

interventions designed to reduce this very serious crime that

affects the most vulnerable of our children and causes

lifelong problems for its victims.

NIBRS definitions of forcible sex offenses

Forcible sex offenses Any sexual act directed against

another person, forcibly and/or against that person’s will; or

not forcibly or against the person’s will where the victim is

incapable of giving consent because of his/her temporary or

permanent mental or physical incapacity.

Forcible rape (except “statutory rape”) The carnal

knowledge of a person, forcibly and/or against that person’s

will; or not forcibly or against the person’s will where the

victim is incapable of giving consent because of his/her

temporary or permanent mental or physical incapacity. If

force was used or threatened, the crime should be classified

as forcible rape regardless of the age of the victim. If no

force was used or threatened and the victim was under the

statutory age of consent, the crime should be classified as

statutory rape.

Forcible sodomy Oral or anal sexual intercourse with

another person, forcibly and/or against that person’s will; or

not forcibly or against the person’s will where the victim is

incapable of giving consent because of his/her youth or

because of his/her temporary or permanent mental or

physical incapacity.

Sexual assault with an object To use an object or

instrument to unlawfully penetrate, however slightly, the

genital or anal opening of the body of another person,

forcibly and/or against that person’s will; or not forcibly or

against the person’s will where the victim is incapable of

giving consent because of his/her youth or because of

his/her temporary or permanent mental or physical

incapacity. An “object” or “instrument” is anything used by

the offender other than the offender’s genitalia. Examples

are a finger, bottle, handgun, stick, etc.

Forcible fondling The touching of the private body parts of

another person for the purpose of sexual gratification,

forcibly and/or against that person’s will; or not forcibly or

against the person’s will where the victim is incapable of

giving consent because of his/her youth or because of

his/her temporary or permanent mental or physical

incapacity. Forcible fondling includes “indecent liberties”

and “child molesting.” Because forcible fondling is an

element of forcible rape, forcible sodomy, and sexual assault

with an object, it should be reported only if it is the sole

forcible sex offense committed against a victim.

Victim, Incident, and Offender Characteristics 13
Appendix A

Law enforcement may report the victim’s perception of

offender age as a point estimate or as a range. This results

in two analysis problems. First, victims often express the

offender’s age as 5-year age range, for example, 25 to 30.

In such instances, the NIBRS data record the midpoint of the

range which would be 27. In other situations the victim gives

a specific age, but these estimates are most likely to fall on

ages divisible by 5, such as 20, 25, 30, 35. Both of these

response patterns create artificial peaks, one at 5-year

points and one between 5-year points. A presentation of the

raw NIBRS data on offender age confirms this peaking in the

data. For presentation in this paper, the offender age data

were smoothed.

Bibliography

Federal Bureau of Investigation. Crime in the United States

1996. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1997.

Federal Bureau of Investigation. NIBRS Flatfile Tape Master

Record Descriptions. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of

Justice, 1995.

Greenfeld, L. Sex Offenses and Offenders: An Analysis of

Data on Rape and Sexual Assault. BJS report, NCJ 163392,

February 1997.

Ringel, C. Criminal Victimization 1996: Changes 1995-96

with Trends 1993-96. BJS Bulletin, NCJ 165812, November

1997.

Snyder, H. and Sickmund, M. Juvenile Offenders and

Victims: 1999 National Report. Washington, DC: U.S.

Department of Justice, Office of Juvenile Justice and

Delinquency Prevention, 1999.

14 Sexual Assault of Young Children as Reported to Law Enforcement 

5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60

0

500

1,000

1,500

2,000

2,500

Age of offender

Raw data

Smoothed

Age distribution of offenders before and after smoothing

Number of offenders

Figure A