A Decade of Decision Making: Prosecutorial Decision Making in Sexual Assault Cases

Ashley K. Fansher () and Bethany Welsh
Additional contact information
Ashley K. Fansher: Department of Criminal Justice, University of North Dakota, Grand Forks, ND 58202, USA
Bethany Welsh: Department of Psychology, University of Houston-Victoria, Victoria, TX 77901, USA

Social Sciences, 2023, vol. 12, issue 6, 1-23

Abstract: In the United States, it is estimated that fewer than 30% of sexual assaults are reported to law enforcement, less than 5% will result in an arrest, and approximately 3% will result in a felony conviction. The present study examines a census of sexual assault reports from 2012 to 2020 in a large police department in the Midwest region of the United States, considering only those cases presented to the district attorney’s office for consideration ( n = 700). Victim characteristics, suspect characteristics, and incident characteristics were examined as relating to a prosecutor accepting a case for charges. Further, a series of “ideal victim” characteristics were identified and used to create an additive scale based on prior research. The most significant predictors of prosecutor acceptance in the full sample were a lack of “date rape” drugs, continued cooperation from the victim, the suspect having a prior arrest for sexual assault, and the assault being reported within 24 h of occurring. A separate model was conducted for only those cases with continued cooperation from the victim. The researchers discuss the implications of these significant factors and suggest training to change false perceptions of victims among criminal justice officials and to increase victim reporting/cooperation in cases of sexual assault.

Keywords: sexual assault; prosecution; victims; criminal justice system; decision-making; charges (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: A B N P Y80 Z00 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0760/12/6/348/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0760/12/6/348/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jscscx:v:12:y:2023:i:6:p:348-:d:1169492

Access Statistics for this article

Social Sciences is currently edited by Ms. Yvonne Chu

More articles in Social Sciences from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().