Forcible Sex Crimes on U.S. College Campuses Up 77 Percent

The Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Statistics and the National Center for Education Statistics released new data on crimes on private and public colleges in the United States that reveal a 77 percent increase in forcible sex crimes.

Highlights of the Indicators of School Crime and Safety Report 2014, Criminal Incidents at Post Secondary Institutions, was produced as a video and posted on YouTube in July. The annual report in mandated by Congress through the Clery Act.

The video shows that overall the number of crimes reported on campus decreased by 29 percent, and the 29,500 criminal incidents on public and private 2-year and 4-year colleges in 2012 is a four percent decrease from the previous year.

However, of the five most common criminal acts committed on campuses – Burglaries, forcible sex offenses, motor vehicle theft, aggravated assault and robbery – forcible sex offenses was the only crime that did not decrease over that time period.

From 2001 to 2012 the number of forcible sex crimes increased by 77 percent, including a 15 percent increase between 2011 and 2012.

“The number of reported forcible sex crimes on campus increased from 2,200 in 2001 to 3,900 in 2012 (a 77 percent increase). More recently, the number of reported forcible sex crimes increased from 3,400 in 2011 to 3,900 in 2012 (a 15 percent increase),” the report states.

According to the report, forcible sex offenses are “any sexual act directed against another person forcibly and/or against that person’s will.” (This definition is included in the source data table for that indicator, which can be found at footnote 4).

The report also notes that over 50 percent of the crimes on campuses were burglaries.

“It is important for all students to feel safe on their college campuses,” the video narration begins and then goes on to detail the crimes being committed on college campuses across the nation.

The video, posted by the National Center for Education Statistics, added this text to the posting: “Do you know how safe our colleges are in America? Do you know the types of crimes that happen in college? Find out the answers to these questions and more in the latest report on college safety.”

The report also includes “hate crimes,” which are described in the video as “offences motivated by the perpetrator’s bias against the victim based on race, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, gender or disability.”

In 2012, 791 hate crimes were reported on U.S. campuses in 2012, according to the report.

The most common hate crimes were destruction, damage, and vandalism, intimidation and simple assault, according to the report. CNS