Patterned characteristics of continued and discontinued sexual assault complaints in the criminal justice process

This article draws from an in-depth analysis of data gathered from 90 Victoria Police operational case files on sexual assault complaints by adults for the period 2004–08. Complaints are examined in relation to offender/victim relationships, victim and offender characteristics, locations of assaults, victim word only evidence, historical versus recent reports, and witnesses. Witness corroboration is analysed at three different levels; this tripartite analysis has not been promulgated previously in the published literature. A bifocal pattern of characteristics was found to distinguish continued from discontinued complaints. The study found that breaking down characteristics into finer distinctions and adding conceptual detail to the existing research corpus provided additional insights. The study contributes to understanding attrition in terms of a general pattern that offers potential for theory