NBC Los Angeles: Less than 4% of reported rapes, sexual assaults, and child sex abuse allegations in certain cities across the United States result in a sex crime conviction, an NBC News investigation found.
The results of the investigation – based on a review of thousands of documents from police departments, prosecutors, and courts in cities from Los Angeles to Boston – underscore what many advocates, experts, and some law enforcement authorities have long said: The system routinely fails to get justice for victims.
The numbers are staggering:
- Violent sex crimes have a lower arrest rate than most violent crimes.
- In Chicago, Black victims of sex crimes are the least likely to see a conviction.
- Those accused of violent sex crimes were often able to secure plea deals that would keep them off the sex offender list. This happens even in California, which usually prohibits the practice.
Tracing convictions is challenging:
"Tracing convictions is ‘really hard because it’s a combination of several different databases that are not available directly to the public,’" said University of Kansas School of Law research professor Corey Yung, who has specialized in this research for the last decade. "Our system, from arrest to conviction, is not transparent. There’s no overarching data source like there are in other countries. It makes it incredibly difficult, in criminal law, to know what’s going on, from reported crimes all the way to convictions."
Experts agree that the system is broken:
Yung said greater awareness has still not translated to more perpetrators being held accountable.
Law enforcement agencies use different metrics:
Law enforcement agencies use different metrics to track crime resolutions. The FBI, for example, uses a "clearance rate," which counts cases that are resolved by conviction or closed due to other factors. Prosecutors track the number of people presented to them with enough evidence to put a case together. Police departments measure the percentage of people arrested for a particular crime.
The conviction rate is low:
In its review, NBC News focused on a basic conviction rate: the total number of violent sex crimes reported to an agency and the number of people found guilty of those specific crimes. But even looking at how police departments measure it – by arrest rate – shows that resolutions to violent sex crimes trail other types of crime.
Experts say the number of sexual crimes reported to officials is an undercount:
"A fraction of cases that get reported to police, a tiny fraction, end up resulting in any kind of sentence for the person accused," said Northwestern University law professor Deborah Tuerkheimer, a former assistant district attorney in Manhattan. "One reason for that is what I call the credibility discount – the likelihood that someone will not be believed, or will be blamed, or will just be disregarded if that person comes forward."
Racial disparities in Chicago:
In the Windy City, reporters spent months combing through the full text of nearly a thousand police reports. Not counting cases still pending, just 3% of reported crimes resulted in any conviction, and 2% in a sex crime conviction. Ninety-nine of the 400-some convicted never saw prison time.
In California, tougher laws don’t lead to more convictions:
Unlike most states, California prohibits defendants from pleading down from an alleged sexual felony to a lesser charge. The practice was barred when the state passed a tough sex offender law in 2006. Despite the plea bargain prohibition, Los Angeles had the lowest conviction rate of all regions NBC News reviewed. There, just 1.4% of violent sex crimes ended in conviction from January 2, 2018, to January 2, 2024.
Methodology:
To match criminal incidents with potential suspects, who may commit more than one crime, reporters stitched together 60 gigabytes worth of records from 16 different agencies and their courts to look at outcomes for some of the worst crimes.
Conclusion:
The investigation reveals a disturbing reality: the system fails to hold perpetrators of sex crimes accountable. The numbers are staggering, and the disparities are stark. It’s time for a change.
Frequently Asked Questions:
Q: What is the conviction rate for sex crimes?
A: Less than 4% of reported sex crimes result in a sex crime conviction.
Q: What is the arrest rate for sex crimes?
A: Violent sex crimes have a lower arrest rate than most violent crimes.
Q: What is the reason for the low conviction rate?
A: The system is not transparent, and there is no overarching data source. It’s hard to know what’s going on, from reported crimes all the way to convictions.
Q: How do law enforcement agencies track crime resolutions?
A: Law enforcement agencies use different metrics to track crime resolutions, including clearance rate, number of people presented with evidence, and percentage of people arrested.
