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Definitions
<br />Imprisonment offense The 9,691
<br />prisoners were men released from
<br />State prisons in 1994 after serving
<br />some portion of the sentence they
<br />received for committing a sex crime
<br />The sex crime they committed is
<br />referred to throughout the report as
<br />their "imprisonment offense." Their
<br />imprisonment offense should not be
<br />confused with any new offense they
<br />may have committed after release.
<br />Sex offender The 9,691 released men
<br />were all violent sex offenders. They are
<br />called "violent" because the crimes
<br />they were imprisoned for are widely
<br />defined in State statutes as "violent"
<br />sex offenses. "Violent" means the
<br />offender used or threatened force in
<br />the commission of the crime or, while
<br />not actually using force, the offender
<br />did not have the victim's "factual" or
<br />"legal" consent. Factual consent means
<br />that, for physical reasons, the victim did
<br />not give consent, such as when the
<br />offender had intercourse with a
<br />sedated hospital patient or with a
<br />woman who had fallen unconscious
<br />from excessive drug taking. "Legal"
<br />consent means that the victim willingly
<br />participated but, in the eyes of the law,
<br />the victim was not old enough or not
<br />sufficiently mentally capable (perhaps
<br />due to mental illness or mental retarda-
<br />tion) to give his or her "legal" consent.
<br />State statutes give many different
<br />names to violent sex offenses: "forcible
<br />rape," "statutory rape," "object rape,"
<br />"sexual assault," "sexual abuse," "forci-
<br />ble sodomy," "sexual misconduct,"
<br />"criminal sexual conduct," "lascivious
<br />conduct," "carnal abuse," "sexual
<br />contact," "unlawful sexual intercourse,"
<br />"sexual battery," "unlawful sexual activ-
<br />ity," "lewd act with minor," "indecent
<br />liberties with a child," "carnal knowl-
<br />edge of a child," "incest with a minor,"
<br />and "child molesting."
<br />"Violent" sex offenses are distinguished
<br />from "nonviolent" sex offenses and
<br />from "commercialized sex offenses."
<br />Nonviolent sex offenses include morals
<br />and decency offenses (for example,
<br />indecent exposure and peeping tom),
<br />bestiality and other unnatural acts,
<br />adultery, incest between adults, and
<br />bigamy. Commercialized sexual
<br />offenses include prostitution, pimping,
<br />and pornography. As used throughout
<br />this report, the terms "sex crimes" and
<br />"sex offenders" refer exclusively to
<br />violent sex offenses.
<br />Each of the 9,691 sex offenders in this
<br />report is classified as either a rapist or
<br />a sexual assaulter. Classification was
<br />based on information about the impris-
<br />onment offense contained in prison
<br />records supplied for each sex offender
<br />released from prison in 1994. Also
<br />based on imprisonment offense infor-
<br />mation, an inmate could be categorized
<br />as a child molester and /or a statutory
<br />rapist. Classification to either of these
<br />two categories is in addition to, not
<br />separate from, classification as a rapist
<br />or sexual assaulter. For example, of
<br />the 3,115 sex offenders classified as
<br />rapists, 338 were child molesters. Or,
<br />to put it another way, the imprisonment
<br />offense for 338 of the 4,295 child
<br />molesters identified in this report was
<br />rape. Similarly, 3,957 of the 4,295 child
<br />molesters were also sexual assaulters.
<br />Sexual
<br />Total Rapists assaulters
<br />Child
<br />molesters 4,295 338 3,957
<br />Statutory
<br />rapists 443 21 422
<br />The report gives statistics for all sex
<br />offenders and each of the four types —
<br />rapists, sexual assaulters, child moles-
<br />ters, and statutory rapists. (See
<br />Methodology on page 37 for details on
<br />how sex offenders were separated into
<br />categories.)
<br />Rapist "Violent sex crimes" are
<br />separated into two categories: "rape"
<br />(short for "forcible rape ") and "other
<br />sexual assault." As used throughout
<br />this report the term "rapist" refers to a
<br />released sex offender whose imprison-
<br />ment offense was defined by State law
<br />as forcible intercourse (vaginal, anal, or
<br />oral) with a female or male. Rape
<br />includes "forcible sodomy" and
<br />"penetration with a foreign object."
<br />Rape excludes statutory rape or any
<br />other nonforcible sexual act with a
<br />minor or with someone unable to give
<br />legal or factual consent. As used
<br />throughout this report, "rape" always
<br />means "forcible rape." "Statutory rape"
<br />is not a type of forcible rape.
<br />A total of 3,115 sex offenders are
<br />identified in the report as released
<br />rapists — about a third (32 %) of the
<br />9,691 released sex offenders.
<br />However, enough information to clearly
<br />distinguish rapists from other sexual
<br />assaulters was not always available in
<br />the prison records used to categorize
<br />sex offenders into different types.
<br />Consequently, the number of rapists
<br />among the 9,691 was almost certainly
<br />greater than 3,115; how much greater
<br />is unknown.
<br />An obstacle to identifying rapists from
<br />penal code information is that the label
<br />"rape" is not used in about half the 50
<br />States. However, released sex offend-
<br />ers whose imprisonment offense was
<br />rape could still be identified. To illus-
<br />trate, in one State, the term criminal
<br />sexual conduct refers to all types of sex
<br />crimes. The statutory language was
<br />consulted to determine if an offender's
<br />imprisonment offense involved "inter-
<br />course" that was "forcible," in accor-
<br />dance with the definition of rape used
<br />in this report. If the offense was not
<br />found to involve intercourse (or
<br />penetration), then the inmate was not
<br />classified as a rapist. The same was
<br />true of force; if the statutory language
<br />did not include a reference to force (or
<br />coercion), the offense was not catego-
<br />rized as rape.
<br />Sexual assaulter By definition in the
<br />report, all sex offenders are either
<br />"rapists" or "sexual assaulters." Sex
<br />offenders whose imprisonment offense
<br />could not be positively identified as
<br />"rape" were placed in the "sexual
<br />assault" category. To the extent that
<br />rapists were reliably distinguished from
<br />sexual assaulters, "sexual assaulters"
<br />identified in this report were released
<br />sex offenders whose imprisonment
<br />Recidivism of Sex Offenders Released from Prison in 1994 3
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