Sex assault cases in NSW reach new record high as more women attacked in Covid-19 lockdown

New crime data has revealed how often women are being attacked across NSW and where it’s happening as they are defenceless.

Almost 90 Australians a day were sexually assaulted last year – many during Covid lockdowns – and a third of them were just in the state of New South Wales.

The shocking figures show the national number of victims has jumped 13 per cent from 2020 to 2021 – the highest ever recorded since the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) started keeping crime data records 29 years ago.

And alarmingly, most victims were female and aged under 18 at the time of the attacks – targeted in homes, during the extended Covid lockdowns.

In NSW there were 270 more victims in 2021 than the previous year with a total of 11,546 people sexually assaulted.

In a snapshot profiling the crime, the ABS Recorded Crime – Victims 2021 report released on Thursday – revealed more than a third of the victims, 11,367, were family and domestic violence related.

It also showed they knew their attacker and in NSW 41 per cent were family or domestic violence related.

It revealed the sexual assaults took place at a residential location and almost 100 per cent of attacks did not involve a weapon.

There were six times more female victim-survivors of sexual assault (26,669) than male victim-survivors (4,350).

The ABS’ Head of Crime and Justice Statistics William Milne said there were 31,118 sexual assaults across the country in 2021, the largest number recorded by police.

Mr Milne said it is the 10th year in a row the number of sexual assault victims has increased.

There were increases in seven states and territories, with the Northern Territory the only one to record a drop in the number of sex assaults.

The highest increases were in Queensland where the number of victims jumped 35 per cent to 1771, followed by Victoria at 12 per cent bringing the total number of victims to 651 and Western Australia 17 per cent with 516.

“The rate has risen from 83 to 121 victims per 100,000 people since 2011, and that accounts for population changes,” Mr Milne said.

Females aged between 15 and 19 are most at risk of sexual assault and males of that age are most likely to be the perpetrators, according to Full Stop Australia.

Hayley Foster, chief executive of Full Stop Australia, which advocates on behalf of sexual assault victims, said its services saw an increase in calls regarding intrafamilial sexual assaults during Covid lockdowns.

“Sadly, these figures are not a surprise to us,” Ms Foster said.

However, while they saw an increase in intrafamilial abuse increased during the pandemic, she said the majority of under 18s who are sexually assaulted are assaulted by their partners and she said that was probably still the case during lockdown.

She said females aged between 15 and 19 are most at risk of sexual assault and males of that age are most likely to be the perpetrators.

Ms Foster said partners were allowed to visit home during lockdowns too.

She said that while Queensland recorded the highest increase, it may be down to better awareness of what sexual assault was and an improved confidence in the police and justice system to report incidents.

“Sexual assault is the fastest growing serious crime in the country,” Ms Foster said.

“This is a crisis that requires urgent attention and proper funding.”

But murders across the nation dropped seven per cent to the lowest rate since 1993 with only 370 victims of homicide and related offences – murder, attempted murder and manslaughter.

Most homicide and related offences occurred at a residential location and involved the use of a weapon.

Most victims were male and aged 18 years and more than a quarter were family and domestic violence related.

In NSW there were 81 murder victims and almost 60 per cent of them knew their attacker. The most common age was between 35 and 64 years old.

The crime statistics also show property crime has increased in 2021 after a drop in 2020.

The number of robbery victims in NSW in the same year dropped to the lowest number recorded since 1993, while the number of victims of unlawful entry with intent jumped eight per cent to 2,116 incidents.

Almost three-quarters of these offences occurred at a residential location.

Blackmail and extortion crimes rose nationally as well from 522 in 2020 to 646 in 2021.

In NSW there were 134 cases of blackmail or extortion up from 101 in 2020.

Motor vehicle thefts also rebounded after a decrease during Covid lockdowns.

There were 9,917 victims of motor vehicle theft recorded in NSW in 2021, an increase of five per cent (482 victims) from the previous year. This increase follows the lowest number of motor vehicle thefts recorded in the time series in 2020 (9,435 victims), coinciding with the introduction of COVID-19 restrictions.

The biggest increases in motor vehicle theft were in Western Australia, Queensland, and News South Wales.

Criminal psychologist Tim Watson-Munroe said the rise in sexual assaults could be “multi-factorial” - impacted on by the lack of mobility during Covid which also reduced the opportunities for random sex assaults.

“People are psychologically frustrated, their futures are uncertain, I think alcohol use and drug use escalated, with people self-medicating at home, and could have had some effect” said Dr Watson-Munroe.

The rise in other crimes including blackmail and extortion may be due to increased cybercrime and cyber stalking.

“People are getting random threats to expose them. Extortion is a function of the times. People are suffering out there and desperate times call for desperate measures for some people…,” said Dr Watson-Munroe.

“I think society is unravelling and there is an anarchistic attitude from some people. Some of the drivers (of crime) we are seeing are from desperate people.”

Social Services Minister Amanda Rishworth said the data was “sobering, particularly that the majority increase relates to children”.

“We know that as awareness of family, domestic and sexual violence increases, so too will reporting,” she added.

“I’m committed to working with my state and territory colleagues to finalise the next National Plan to reduce and ultimately end family, domestic and sexual violence.

“We don’t want the next generation of women and children to have to deal with this scourge.”

If you or anyone you know is in need or crisis please call the National Sexual Assault, Domestic and Family Violence Counselling Service on 1800 RESPECT (1800 737 732) or Lifeline 131 114.

Originally published as Sex assault cases in NSW reach new record high as more women attacked in Covid-19 lockdown