Surge in Sex Crime Reports in Wake of Jimmy Savile Scandal
By David Barrett
Victims came forward to report more than 4,500 extra sex crimes in England and Wales in the year to June - a total of 55,800 - compared with the previous 12 months, the Office for National Statistics said. Experts have described the sudden leap as the “Yewtree effect”, named after the police investigation into Savile’s five decades as the country’s most prolific abuser. There was a 100 per cent rise in “historic” sex abuse allegations that took place more than 20 years ago, the figures show, as victims are thought to be more confident their allegations will be taken seriously by police. But the high-profile Savile investigation is also thought to have led to a rise in the number of recent attacks reported to police, which rose 5 per cent year-on-year. In all, there were nearly 1,400 more rapes in the year reported to police compared with the previous year, plus 3,100 other sex offences. Crime figures also showed a huge leap in fraud, which has rocketed by nearly 60 per cent in just five years, including a 21 per cent jump in the last 12 months. There were 230,000 frauds recorded in the 12 months to June. The surge in figures on fraud is largely due to a change in the way the crime is recorded. All fraud offences across England and Wales are now recorded by a central organisation, Action Fraud, rather than by local forces. It is thought to reflect a change in crime trends as crooks turn to "low-risk" offences such as identity theft and online fraud, as they abandon other crimes such as burglary because they carry a greater risk of being caught. Theft from the person - which includes pick-pocketing - also rose 8 per cent, but overall crime recorded by police fell 5 per cent to 3.7 million offences. The separate Crime Survey for England and Wales, which is based on interviews with adults about their experiences of crime regardless of whether it was reported to police, estimated there had been 8.5 million crimes in the year. Norman Baker, the crime prevention minister, said: “Police reform is working and crime is falling. Recorded crime has dropped yet again, by more than 10 per cent under the coalition government and the crime survey says that crime has more than halved since its peak in 1995. “This is really positive news. Forces are rising to the challenge of making savings whilst cutting crime and delivering a better service to the public. “ He added: “England and Wales are safer than they have been for decades but we will continue to deliver measures which keep pace with the changing nature of crime and improve our ability to combat emerging issues. “That is why we have recently launched the National Crime Agency to tackle the growing threat of serious and organised criminality.”
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