Death in Sadistic Sexual Crimes: A Neural Network Analysis of Factors Associated With a Lethal Outcome

This study aims to determine the factors associated with the victim’s death in sadistic sexual crimes. Specifically, this article examined whether the lethal outcome is more likely to be associated with an escalation of violence during the crime-commission process, an instrumental motivation, or the manifestation of specific sadistic fantasies. We used a database including 735 cases of sadistic sexual assaults. Among this sample, 100 sadistic sexual assaults ended with a lethal outcome. Bivariate analyses, logistic regression, and neural network models were used to identify how the different factors predicted the lethal outcome of sadistic crimes. Our results show that the expression of sadistic behaviors associated with torture and/or bodily punishment plays a fundamental role in the lethal outcome of sadistic sexual crimes. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Sexual Victimization Involving Solo Female Offenders: A Crime Script Approach

This study aims to provide a theoretically grounded analysis of the crime-commission process of solo females involved in sexual offending, using crime scripts. The sample includes 93 cases of sexual assaults perpetrated by female offenders in an extrafamilial context. Latent class analysis was used to identify the scripts involved in female sexual offending as well as to explore the relationship between each step of the crime-commission process. Also, additional variables related to victim, offender, and location characteristics were used to test the external validity of the model. Results suggest four different scripts used by females: Daytime Indoor, Coercive Outdoor, Coercive Indoor, and Nighttime Indoor. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Conjugal Visits in Prisons Discourse: The Prisoners’ Voice in Malawi

The issue of possible provision of prisoners’ conjugal rights in jurisdictions not yet allowing them, such as Malawi, is still an intricate debate amongst the stakeholders. However, the most important stakeholder in the issue, the prisoner, is usually left out of the discourse. This study analyzed the perceptions of randomly sampled 305 prisoners on conjugal visits at one of the central prisons in Malawi. Both qualitative and quantitative data from prisoners’ perceptions were collected and used concurrently. The key finding was that prisoners (male and female) in Malawi generally had positive perceptions regarding conjugal visits since more than 80% of the respondents (n=305) reported that conjugal visits were good and recommended their possible introduction in Malawi. These incarcerated persons opined that conjugal visits reduced problems of homosexuality, sexual assaults, physical violence in prisons, supporting prisoners’ rehabilitation and reintegration efforts as well as helping prisoners in preserving and establishing family ties. Prisoners also viewed conjugal visits as another way of dealing with the HIV and AIDS problem in Malawi prisons. Though the potential challenge was reported to be its costs, it was opined that the programme was still worthy of introducing. It was therefore concluded that the prisoners’ voice is also valuable in not only conjugal visits discourse but also in all issues related to law and policy that concern them.

New Futures, same old Fear: Gender-based Violence and Victim Coping in Contemporary Young Adult Dystopian Fiction

The ability of dystopian fiction to offer critical views of futures riddled with the devastating consequences of today’s failures is pervasive also in its literary subgenre targeting young readers. While scholarship on these novels is extensive, the prevalence of sexual assaults in this subgenre requires attention. This study offers an introductory analysis of two contemporary young adult dystopian trilogies, Veronica Roth’s Divergent (2011-2013) and Beth Revis’ Across the Universe (2011-2013), with a focus on the sexual assaults the protagonists endure. The discussion draws on trauma and sexual abuse research to ascertain how and if these future societies and heroines challenge traditional representations of this crime.

Wrongful Conviction in Sexual Assault: Stranger Rape, Acquaintance Rape, and Intra-Familial Child Sexual Assaults

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Preliminary report of sexual assaults at Ekiti Sexual Assault Referral Centre, Ado-Ekiti, Southwest, Nigeria (Moremi Clinic)

There has been a surge in the incidence and severity of sexual assaults globally with the insurgence of COVID-19 owing to lockdown restrictions. Ekiti Sexual Assault Referral Centre, Ado-Ekiti also known as Moremi Clinic was established in June 2020 as a multisectoral response centre to this surge. Seventy-four survivors accessed medical services from June 2020 to May 2021. Adolescents made up 54.1% while the median age was 14.5 years. Only seven survivors were seen within 24 h of the event and around a quarter had follow-up visits. A quarter of survivors reported repeat episodes of sexual assault. Complications documented were sexually transmitted infections (13.5%), depression (4.1%) and posttraumatic stress disorder (5.4%). There was a failure of contraception in 4.5% of survivors who had taken emergency contraceptive pills. For improvements in quality of care, strategies to ensure early presentation and encourage follow-up visits must be introduced.

Trauma in Rapes and Assaults

Psychological trauma primarily affects children and adolescents; it mostly results from physical and sexual maltreatment. In the Medico-Judicial Unit Center for Sexual Violence Victims in Tours, France, which I joined in 1992 for research and to give treatment, underage patients represented about three-quarters of patients. At the same time, a national survey was conducted in collaboration with Marie Choquet’s “Adolescent Health” group (INSERM), which targeted several thousand adolescents representing the general population. It revealed that almost one out of five adolescents had experienced physical or sexual assault, and that although the number of sexual assaults probably does not exceed that of physical assaults, most of the time their psychological consequences do considerably exceed those of physical assaults. Several symptoms appear after experiencing rapes or assaults. They have a distinct semiology and independent evolutions. We isolated three of them: dissociative and phobic traumatic syndrome, re-experiencing traumatic syndrome, and borderline-like traumatic syndrome. They are generally triggered all at the same time or in close succession. Re-experiencing traumatic syndrome is profound, but the other two are often more worrying, particularly in relation to children and adolescents, because they generate disorders in their psychological development.