Number of rape victims reporting to Mackay Police revealed

One of the most abhorrent crimes shows no sign of slowing down as the lessening societal stigma surrounding sexual assault has resulted in more victims coming forward.

Almost 40 men and women in Mackay have reported to police they were a victim of a rape or an attempted rape already this year.

Queensland Police figures show victims have come forward in droves in the past six months in the Mackay policing district.

Most of the 39 are adult women but a shocking majority are young girls who told police they were sexually assaulted since January.

A total of 16 of those who reported being a victim of rape or an attempted rape were considered to be minors.

Anonymous protesters outside Mackay Courthouse during a rape case in 2014. Picture: Mark Calleja

The 39 victims recorded this year is just one less than what was reported during the same period in 2020.

One of the most disturbing cases from that year involved a 13-year-old boy who was sexually abused by a family friend.

The boy, Mackay’s District Court was told, believed he was playing a game of hide and seek before the “uncle like figure” sexually assaulted him.

>> ‘You took advantage of an extremely drunk woman’

It is just one less from the same period last year.

The same statistics show Mackay’s cops have had 92 victims of common assault in 2021, which jumped massively from 40 in the same period last year.

However, the Mackay district is reporting fewer victims of robberies so far this year, with just 27 people subjected to armed and unarmed hold-ups in the past six months in comparison to 32 in the first half of 2020.

Just this month, Mackay’s CIB began an investigation into the robbery of a 59-year-old man in the CBD in broad daylight.

Police said two men struck the man to the back of the head, forcing him to drop his walking stick and fall, before making off with cash from his wallet.

Last month a woman was jailed for her role in robbing an Airlie Beach backpackers where a hammer and a knuckle duster was brandished.

Again in May, a good Samaritan had her car stolen by a man in Marian who she was attempting to help after stopping when he crashed.