The statistics are appalling. Over the past decade, the number of sexual assaults has risen four times as fast as the total crime rate. A record 100,000 rapes were reported in 1990. An estimated 3 to 4 million women are battered each year by their husbands or partners. As shocking as these statistics are, they do not represent the full scope of the problem.
Rape is one of the most underreported crimes in America.
In addition, there are no official statistics collected by the federal government which tally the number of women beaten in their homes. The figures which we do have are estimates based on special victimization studies. However, in the interest of saving time, I will confine my comments only to those initiatives which fall under the jurisdiction of the Subcommittee on Crime and Criminal Justice. The Violence Against Women Act would provide states with the resources to improve and implement policies that encourage the arrest of the criminal and prosecution of the crime, to develop and train special units of police, prosecutors and victim advocates, and to streamline and systematize the process for identifying and tracking arrests, prosecutions and convictions. In order to combat this high rate of recidivism for rapists, the Violence Against Women Act requires mandatory treatment and rehabilitation for sex offenders in federal prison in addition to their sentence.