How do reporting, prosecution, and conviction rates differ for male and female perpetrators of rape?
Executive summary
Most available data show that the overwhelming majority of alleged rapists are male and most victims are female, and across jurisdictions reporting, arrests, prosecutions and convictions for rape are rare—only a small fraction of incidents move from report to conviction—yet the sources assembled do not offer robust, consistent national figures that directly compare prosecution and conviction rates for male versus female perpetrators [1] [2] [3]. Research literature and investigations stress a large “justice gap” and funnel of attrition—reporting is low, many reports never lead to arrest, and still fewer to prosecution or conviction—while also noting that gender of perpetrator and victim can affect outcomes in ways that are documented unevenly across studies and countries [4] [5].
1. Reporting: who tells and who is counted
Victim reporting is the first choke point: multiple sources document that most sexual assaults are never reported to police—estimates vary (for example 37% of sexual assaults reported in one dataset or 63% unreported in another), and only a minority of victims come forward; men are undercounted in these reports because male victims are less likely to disclose and because measurement historically focused on female victims, meaning official data understate female-perpetrated offenses and male victimization [6] [2] [1] [7]. The practical implication is that female-perpetrated rape is infrequently visible in police and prosecution data not only because it is less common, but because social stigma and narrow legal definitions have suppressed reporting of male victims and nontraditional victim–offender gender pairings [3] [1].
2. Arrests and prosecutions: attrition swallows cases
Once reported, cases fall away quickly. Studies show for many samples only a fraction of reports lead to arrest—examples include research finding 18 arrests per 100 reported rapes of teenage girls and women in one study, and FBI data showing roughly one-third of reported rapes resulted in an arrest in 2018—after arrest, prosecutors decline or drop many cases, producing dramatic attrition before trial [8] [9] [2]. The literature attributes these prosecutorial decisions to evidentiary weakness, delayed or untested forensic evidence, and credibility judgments shaped by rape myths; systematic reviews of barriers emphasize that gendered stereotypes about victims and offenders shape police and prosecutorial decision-making, which in turn can differentially affect cases with female perpetrators or male victims [4] [10].
3. Convictions: low overall, limited direct gender comparisons
Conviction rates for rape are uniformly low across contexts: multiple sources report that only a small percentage of rapes result in conviction or incarceration—for every 1,000 sexual assaults, roughly 25–50 lead to arrest or conviction depending on the metric and year, and investigative reporting found under 4% conviction rates in some U.S. city samples [2] [11] [12]. While several sources explicitly say conviction rates “differ by the gender of both the perpetrator and victim,” the assembled materials do not provide consistent, nationwide comparative statistics that quantify how much higher or lower conviction likelihood is for women accused of rape versus men accused of rape [3] [4]. Where studies do examine differences, notable patterns are context-dependent: prosecutions and convictions sometimes hinge on victim gender, the relationship between parties, and evidentiary strength rather than perpetrator gender alone [13] [5].
4. Why direct comparisons are scarce and contested
Reliable, comparable measures are scarce because definitions of “rape” vary across jurisdictions and over time, reporting biases differ by victim gender, and many datasets historically assumed male perpetrators and female victims—producing structural blind spots for female-perpetrated offenses and male victimization [3] [7]. Systematic reviews cite pervasive barriers—rape myths, inconsistent consent laws, delayed DNA testing, statute-of-limitations rules and resource constraints—that make case outcomes contingent on non-gendered evidentiary factors as well as gendered social attitudes, complicating simple comparisons of prosecution or conviction rates by perpetrator sex [4] [6].
5. Bottom line and gaps in the record
The bottom line in the available reporting is twofold and plain: most alleged rapists recorded by the criminal justice system are men and conviction/prosecution rates for rape are low overall; secondary claims that conviction rates differ by perpetrator gender are reported in the literature but the sources provided do not supply a clear, consistent numeric comparison of prosecution or conviction rates for male versus female perpetrators at a national level—meaning precise quantification of that gender gap remains an open empirical question that current sources document only unevenly [1] [2] [3] [4].