Reporting and Recording Sexual Offences

Abstract

Reports of sexual offences come in to the police from individuals and other sources, such as child protection conferences and Multi-Agency Safeguarding Hubs (MASH). In the past, the police have been criticised for receiving these reports within a ‘culture of disbelief’. Does such a culture really exist or have current training initiatives been able to change this culture? The chapter also looks at the movement of initial reports into recorded crimes that require investigation and the monitoring of this movement by such bodies as the national police Rape Monitoring Group.