Ireland: More than 1/3 of sex offenses committed by minors.

According to this article in the Irish Examiner, 2017 saw a “worrying rise in sex offenses involving juveniles”. The title didn’t do justice to the other “worrying” findings in the article… that move than one-third of the people considered sex offenders against juveniles are juveniles themselves.

Some points from the article and findings from the Police service of Ireland:

• Cases of minors caught in possession of child pornography almost trebled in 2017
• children under 18 accounting for more than a third of all recorded sex crimes
• juveniles were responsible for 35% of all sexual offences recorded in that year
• A 37% rise in sexual assault (not aggravated), from 163 to 224;
• A 181% jump in child pornography (as recorded by Gardaí), from 21 to 59
• of the 59 child pornography cases, Nine involved ‘consensual peer to peer sharing’ of personal images.
• In 30 of the 47 child defilement cases, it said the “offender and injured party were in a relationship and had made the mutual decision to engage in sexual behaviour”.
• In many cases both parties were not aware that by engaging in such behaviour, the male was committing a criminal offence.

Some take-aways from the article.

• Much of the “worrying” rise in sex offenses is kids being kids in the age of new technology.
• Many (one-third) of those being labeled as sex offenders (a label intended to protect children) are children themselves.
• Many of the “offenders” and “victims” had no idea they were committing crimes or being victimized.