Sexual violence rises alarmingly in Jan-June

Incidents of sexual offences increased alarmingly in the country in January to June this year compared to the corresponding period of the previous year, the police said.

According to the statistics of the Helsinki Police Department, sexual offences increased by 45 per cent in the first six months than that the first half of 2017, said an official press release.

The incidents of sexual violence include rapes, sexual exploitation of children, and sexual harassment.

“The police have been more effective in proactively detecting cases of sexual violence in Helsinki this year, and this is reflected in the statistics. For example, early in the year they arrested a man suspected of several dozen sexual offences,” said Detective Superintendent Juhani Vuorisalo, referring to the Helsinki Police Department’s violent crime investigations.

The statistics can be affected by a single major case. Vuorisalo refers to a case in which a Helsinki man is suspected of sexual abuse of more than 10 boys under the age of 16. This single case shows a statistical spike in sexual abuse of children.

“Sexual crimes have also been widely discussed in public and given extensive publicity. This has helped to lower the threshold for reporting offences such as sexual harassment, more of which have thereby come to the attention of the police. The number of sexual offences has not, therefore, necessarily increased, but more have been notified to the police,” Vuorisalo added.

The police statistics also showed an increase (+2.3%) in narcotics offences than that in the last year.

“Over the last year, the police have carried out a number of theme-based, special control operations on narcotics-related issues in key locations in Helsinki. The investigation of narcotics offences is very much about active police detection, i.e., when the police have resources for the detection of such offences, it shows in the statistics,” said Detective Chief Inspector Lasse Jortikka of the Helsinki Police Department’s narcotics offence investigations.

The report, however, showed that the incident of fraud declined (-19%) this year significantly.