Rape In The United States

1. Nearly 90,000 people reported being raped in the United States in 2008. There is an arrest rate of 25%.

2. Rapes are rarely reported to law enforcement. The 2007 report for the Department of Justice shows only 18% cases of forcible rape reported in the general population sample (even less so for drug-facilitated rape, 10%; numbers for the sample of college women are yet lower, with 16% reporting for forcible rape.)

3. Insurance companies have denied coverage for rape victims, claiming a variety of bases for their actions. Some insurance companies have allegedly denied sexual-assault victims mental-health treatment, stating that the service is not medically necessary.

4. Federal law does not use the term "rape". Rape is grouped with all forms of non-consensual sexual acts under chapter 109a of the United States Code. Under federal law the punishment for rape can range from a fine to Life imprisonment. The severity of the punishment is based on the use of violence, the age of the victim and whether drugs or intoxicants were used to override consent. If the perpetrator is a repeat offender the law prescribes automatically doubling the maximum sentence.

5. The U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics states that 91% of rape victims are female and 9% are male, and 99% of rapists are male.

6. In the United States the use of drugs, especially alcohol, frequently plays a part in rape. In 47% of rapes, both the victim and the perpetrator had been drinking. In 17%, only the perpetrator had been. 7% of the time, only the victim had been drinking.

7. Rapes where neither the victim nor the perpetrator had been drinking account for 29% of all rapes.Over two-thirds of all rapes occur in someone's home. 30.9% occur in the perpetrators' homes, 26.6% in the victims' homes and 10.1% in homes shared by the victim and perpetrator. 7.2% occur at parties, 7.2% in vehicles, 3.6% outdoors and 2.2% in bars.

8. Rape prevalence among women in the U.S. (the percentage of women who experienced rape at least once in their lifetime so far) is in the range of 15%–20%, with different studies agreeing with each other.
[Source blog.kkaggarwal.com]