EXTRACT
An analysis by NationalWorld of Home Office crime outcome figures reveals that it is indeed far from unusual for alleged rape victims to have to contend with such long waits – it is even commonplace.
If you reported a rape in England and Wales in 2020, there is a one in eight chance you were still waiting at the end of January 2022 for either the police or the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) to make a decision on whether to bring charges.
The database shows there were 6,816 rape offences first recorded in 2020 that still had no outcome assigned to them by that point.
That was 12.5% of all rapes recorded in 2020.
‘No outcome assigned’ means the police, in conjunction with the CPS, had neither decided to bring charges, nor to close the case with an unsuccessful outcome – leaving victims stuck in limbo.
Of the outstanding 2020 cases, 1,476 were recorded between January and March, meaning victims had been waiting at least 22 months by the time the last snapshot of outcomes was taken by the Home Office sometime after January 2022 – and possibly even longer.
Which forces are taking the longest to make decisions?
The Met was responsible for 1,035 of the outstanding rape cases, the highest number of any police force in England and Wales and 15% of the national total.
But when it comes to the proportion of crimes recorded, the worst performance came from Staffordshire Police where an astounding 41% of cases (389 out of 942) remained open and still pending a result.
It was followed by Wiltshire Police (180 out of 554, or 33%), and Northumbria Police (363 out of 1,441, or 25%).
Essex Police, at the other end of the scale, had closed 98% of cases, with only 2% still outstanding – although it had a poor record on bringing charges for those closed cases.
National World Report
If you follow the above link you can read the rest of the article and look up your own police force in their charts.