'BBC: 'Eleven transgender inmates sexually assaulted in male prisons last year'

[missproportionate]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-52748117

I haven't seen a thread about this but I find it hard to get my head round.

"of 124 sexual assaults in five women's jails over the previous nine years, from 2010 to 2018, seven had been carried out by trans prisoners.'

Also I just can't get the stats right in my head from the way they are quoted. The semantics are twisted in knots, and anyone not familiar with any of this would find it impenetrable.

[ShootsFruitAndLeaves]

If you continue with that blog it says only 1% of trans people have GRCs so they don't think there could be many missing from the total. This doesn't exactly follow in that we don't know if for example rapists seek GRCs because it would give them a cast iron entry ticket to women's prison.

There are about 2000 genetically male people with GRCs and we don't know if for example half of them are in prison. That's not likely of course, but if the government prioritise secrecy of people who in most cases will obviously from meeting them have been born male (so the supposed secrecy of a GRC is a meaningless conceit if it's blindingly obvious), over protecting women's safety, then we have no way of knowing.

[ShootsFruitAndLeaves]

Indeed, Kantastic, and said violent criminal is unmistakably male, and nobody is likely to think 'thats a woman', so any secrecy of said GRC would only serve to protect their criminality

[Michelleoftheresistance]

I can't remember the thread, but a MNetter who has DSD has posted about their experience before. They described being in prison with female anatomy with a male exterior appearance, and that the prison staff managed the whole situation so that they were never expected to shower in sight of other inmates, all vulnerabilities were met and no other inmate ever knew. They described on the thread how they really didn't understand how TW could not be just as easily housed in male prisons under the same guidelines and provision for vulnerable prisoners.

The safety (so put 'em in with females) is a red herring, as there are many, many existing and additional ways this valid need could be met. As usual, the bottom line is an agenda to validate males in their personal choices regardless of the impact on females.

[PaleBlueMoonlight]

So the prison system can officially know how many transwomen with GRCs there are? If they couldn’t officially know then they couldn’t put transwomen with a GRC in a special unit because they wouldn’t be able (officially) to identify them.

If it is true that prisons don’t have to officially pretend that they don’t know who is a transwoman with a GRC, then why isn’t this info recorded?

[Oncewasblueandyellowtwo]

Yr1parent

The validation comes from being housed in a female estate.

[nauticant]

I'm coming to the view PaleBlueMoonlight that many institutions and individuals with responsibility for safeguarding are deliberately arranging things so they themselves are never presented with accurate and clear statistics. If such statistics existed either they'd have to be consciously ignored, putting those in charge at risk of being knowingly responsible for harm, or they would have to act and it would create the most almighty mess. It could lead to something like a civil war between government departments, charities, lobbying groups, etc.

[happyhappyhour]

Okay looking at it the stats available in that article appears to show that, in female prisons, trans women are a lot more likely to sexually assault than ‘cis’ female prisoners?

[ShootsFruitAndLeaves]

I think I am correct that the BBC has sought to make the news here?

Danny Shaw seems like he's angling for a job at Prick News.

twitter.com/DannyShawBBC/status/1263437767876456450

"There's been much reporting over the past few years about the sexual crimes allegedly committed by transgender prisoners and the dangers they pose. These figures for 2019 suggest many more of them were victims of sexual assault than perpetrators:"

There is nothing alleged about this. Most transgender prisoners are sex offenders. It is 100% certain that transgender prisoners commit sex crimes and pose dangers. They have been convicted of this. The word 'allegedly' is contrary to basic journalistic style, as it implies that it is not true.

[DeployTheTut]

I found this article, which discusses the total numbers of assaults in prisons assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/737991/sexual-assaults-reported-prisons-exploratory-findings.pdf

[DeployTheTut]

Several interesting snippets jump out:
“ The number of sexual assaults reported in prison saw a notable increase between 2012 and 2014, from 113 incidents in 2012, to 170 incidents in 2013, and 228 in 2014. This increase was disproportionate when compared to smaller increases in the number of all assaults reported in custody over the same time period”
Why has there been a jump on the numbers of assaults between 2012-2014? What has happened could be 1) an increase in numbers of perps 2) a failure in safeguarding resulting in more perp access to victims. Which one is it?

[DeployTheTut]

The paper sets out to answer:
“ What is the prevalence of different types of reported sexual assault?
• What appear to be the motives for sexual assaults?
• What are the characteristics of the victims and
assailants of reported sexual assaults?
• Are there any differences between types of sexual assault (e.g. characteristics of perpetrators, location, motivation)?
• What evidence is there of repeat victimisation?”

[DeployTheTut]

Sorry. The dates covered range from 2002 to 2014.
Between 2002-2014, 1742 incidents were reported.
That averages out at 145 incidents per year, over 12 years.

[DeployTheTut]

It says that 823 separate perpetrators were identified, and there were 924 victims.

The 1742 assaults were coded as follows:
1- Assault involving groin or genital contact of either party (touching of these body areas, clothed or unclothed).
2- Assault involving no groin or genital contact of either party (touching of other body areas not including genital or groin areas, clothed or unclothed).
3- Non-penile penetration (penetration of vagina or anus with anything other than penis).
4- Rape (penetration of vagina, anus or mouth by penis).
5- Sexual activity without consent (where victim is forced to participate in a sex act with assailant or forced to masturbate or engage with a third party).
6- Sexual harassment including exposure (including verbal threats or harassment and exposure including masturbation in front of someone, but no evidence of physical touching or contact).
7- Insufficient information

[DeployTheTut]

Nature of sexual assault
Non-genital contact 341 (20%)
Genital contact 285 (16%)
Rape 188 (11%)
Non-penile penetration 179 (10%)
Sexual harassment 29 (2%)
Sexual activity w/o consent 19 (1%) Insufficient information 701 (40%)
TOTAL 1,742 (100%)

[DeployTheTut]

“20% of assaults that were classified as sexual entailed physical contact, but did not involve genital or groin contact of either party.
Of these, 69% (n=236) involved a prisoner assaulting someone other than another prisoner – i.e. staff, officer or ‘other’.”

So our total number of assaults on PRISONERS can be reduced from 1742-236=1506
Average assaults on prisoners over 12 years (2002-2014)= 1506/12= 125.5 per year

[DeployTheTut]

“16% of cases were coded as sexual assault involving genital or groin contact of either party. Of these, over three-quarters involved incidents of prisoners on prisoners (79%, n=224) while 15% (n=43) were where a prisoner had assaulted staff or an officer.“

So we can reduce our grand total of assaults on prisoners further.
1506 - 43 = 1463
(I’m going to stop doing the average per year, for a bit)

[Sicario]

Heaven's sake.
Headline correction: men sexually assault other men in prison.

[DeployTheTut]

“11% of cases were coded as rape. Of these, the vast majority involved an allegation of a prisoner assaulting another prisoner (94%, n=176). This was also the type of assault most likely to occur within a cell with over three- quarters (76%, n=143) of rapes taking place here. Rape was also the most likely of all the assault categories to see some evidence of repeat victimisation.“

143 rapes of prisoners, by prisoners, reported over 12 years. So we don’t know how many of the remaining rapes (188-176 = 12 rapes) were committed by prisoners on guards, other staff, visitors, or how many were by guards, staff or visitors on prisoners. But we do know that the cell is an extremely dangerous location to be trapped with a Rapist (well, of course it is!), because 143 rapes (76%of the total number) happened there.

[DeployTheTut]

“ 10% of cases were classed as assault by non-penile penetration. More than half of assaults involving non-penile penetration were apparently motivated by the retrieval of an item (see Table 2), that item most often being drugs which were sought in three-quarters of these assaults. Three-quarters of these assaults were carried out within cells (n=134) and three-quarters by more than one perpetrator (n=134).”

Ew. A lot of people hiding contraband inside their body, then getting assaulted, often in their cells, and often by gangs, to steal the contraband.

[DeployTheTut]

“ 55% (n=962) of sexual assaults occurred in a cell and 13% (n=226) involved cellmates (95% of which occurred within a cell, n=215). The remainder were unknown.”

So the riskiest place for sexual assault in prison is a cell, where 55% of all assaults happened.

[Kantastic]

Tut that report seems to be about men sexually assaulting other men in men's prisons, are you leading up to any particular point with the quotes from it?

[DeployTheTut]

Age
Average age of sample: 29 years
Average age for females: 28 males: 29
Average ages of assailant: 31 and victim: 28
Average age across prison is 33, for males and females.

Ethnicity
79% of sample were White (74% across prisons)
11% of sample were Black (14% across prisons)
5% of sample were Asian (7% across prisons)

Sex
11% of the sample were female (5% across prisons) n=202 (this includes assailants and victims)
remember above we were told there were 823 identified perps, and 924 victims (823+924= 1747 in sample)
So 202 females in the sample.
(1747-202= 1545) 1545 males.

(This paper really makes you work to get to the data we need!)

This next bit is very interesting:
“ Published statistics show that for much of the period between 2002 and 2014, a disproportionately high number of sexual assault incidents were reported in women’s establishments. For example, in 2002, 6% of the prison population was female, but 12% of reported sexual assaults occurred in female establishments. This over-representation continued until 2012, since when proportions of incidents in male and female establishments more closely aligned to their respective share of the prison population.
It is possible that, towards the start of this timeframe, some of this imbalance was due to men being less likely than women to report such incidents to prison staff.”

Yeah, that’s one reason, I guess. No other possible reasons are listed.

[DeployTheTut]

Sorry, it took a lot to get to the disaggregation of the data to expose the sexes in the sample set, and it doesn’t disaggregate it further, to show how many of the incidents reported took place in the female estate.

[TheProdigalKittensReturn]

I can't remember the thread, but a MNetter who has DSD has posted about their experience before. They described being in prison with female anatomy with a male exterior appearance, and that the prison staff managed the whole situation so that they were never expected to shower in sight of other inmates, all vulnerabilities were met and no other inmate ever knew. They described on the thread how they really didn't understand how TW could not be just as easily housed in male prisons under the same guidelines and provision for vulnerable prisoners.

This is what Thailand, which probably has the highest number of both TW as a general percentage of the population and TW as percentage of the prison population in the world, is going to do in their prisons. If there are enough individuals involved to justify a dedicated wing in at least one men's prison then that would seem like the best solution, as obviously it's preferable for prisoners to be able to have some level of social contact with others if possible for the sake of their mental health.

[DeployTheTut]

This info from The Howard League states that raw number of assaults recorded in male prisons in 2012 was 107, increasing to 165 in 2013. In the female estate, recorded assaults were 6 in 2012, and 4 in 2013.
howardleague.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/Coercive-sex-in-prison.pdf