“In fiscal 2008, the department received a total of 2,908 reports of sexual assault involving service members, representing an eight percent increase from fiscal 2007.”

Quote pulled from this DOD press release, which provides an overview of this DOD report. Excerpt from Executive Summary below:

– Aggregate Report of Sexual Assault Incidents: In FY08 there were 2,908
reports of sexual assault involving Military Service members:
-There were 2,265 Unrestricted Reports involving Military Service
members. 1,594 (70%) of these reports had Military Service members as
victims. Some of these reports included more than one victim resulting in a
total of 1,752 Service members victims in the Unrestricted Reports
received.
– Service member victims made 753 Restricted Reports of sexual assault.
Fifteen percent (110) of victims that made Restricted Reports decided to
change to an Unrestricted Report and participate in a criminal investigation.
As a result of the change, 643 remained as Restricted Reports.
– The Military Services completed a total of 2,389 criminal investigations on
reports made during and prior to FY08, which involved 2,763 subjects.

Via. A study last year found that 15% U.S. veterans suffered sexual trauma.   Nan Hunter blogged here about the pressure on U.S. servicewomen not to report sexual assualts. Kathleen Bergin blogged about the issue here. Two years ago I did a related retrospective link round up here.

–Ann Bartow

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