Historical Statistics of CSA Cases at DOJ

Taura Edgar made this Freedom of Information request to Department of Justice

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The request was partially successful.

Dear Department of Justice,

We request the following statistical information by year from January 2010 through December 2021:

1) The number of child sexual abuse (“CSA”) cases charged
2) The section and the Ordinance under which the CSA case was charged, including but not limited to the following:
a) Crimes Ordinance (Cap 200)
i) Section 47 incest by men
ii) Section 48 Incest by women of or over 16
iii) Section 118 Rape
iv) Section 118A Non-consensual buggery
v) Section 118B Assault with intent to commit buggery
vi) Section 118G Procuring others to commit homosexual buggery
vii) Section 118H Gross indecency with or by man under 21
viii) Section 118I Gross indecency by man with male mentally incapacitated person
ix) Section 118J Gross indecency by man with man otherwise than in private
x) Section 118K Procuring gross indecency by man with man
xi) Section 119 Procurement by threats
xii) Section 120 Procurement by false pretences
xiii) Section 121 Administering drugs to obtain or facilitate unlawful sexual act
xiv) Section 122 Indecent assault
xv) Section 123 Intercourse with girl under 13
xvi) Section 124 Intercourse with girl under 16
xvii) Section 125 Intercourse with mentally incapacitated person
xviii) Section 126 Abduction of unmarried girl under 16
xix) Section 127 Abduction of unmarried girl under 18 for sexual intercourse
xx) Section 128 Abduction of mentally incapacitated person from parent or guardian for sexual act
xxi) Section 129 Trafficking in persons to or from Hong Kong
xxii) Section 130 Control over persons for purpose of unlawful sexual intercourse or prostitution
xxiii) Section 131 Causing prostitution
xxiv) Section 132 Procurement of girl under 21
xxv) Section 133 Procurement of mentally incapacitated person
xxvi) Section 134 Detention for intercourse or in vice establishment
xxvii) Section 135 Causing or encouraging prostitution of, intercourse with, or indecent assault on, girl or boy under 16
xxviii) Section 136 Causing or encouraging prostitution of mentally incapacitated person
xxix) Section 137 Living on earnings of prostitution of others
xxx) Section 138A Use, procurement or offer of persons under 18 for making pornography or for live pornographic performances
xxxi) Section 140 Permitting girl or boy under 13 to resort to or be on premises or vessel for intercourse
xxxii) Section 141 Permitting young person to resort to or be on premises or vessel for intercourse, prostitution, buggery or homosexual act
xxxiii) Section 142 Permitting mentally incapacitated person to resort to or be on premises or vessel for intercourse, prostitution or homosexual act
xxxiv) Section 146 Indecent conduct towards child under 16
xxxv) Section 147 Soliciting for an immoral purpose
xxxvi) Section 148 Indecency in public
xxxvii) Prevention of Child Pornography Ordinance (Cap 579)
3) The outcome of the charge (e.g., pleaded guilty, trial)
4) The sentence handed down

Regards,
Taura Edgar
https://www.talkhongkong.org/

Department of Justice

Thank you very much for the message. The content has been noted. We shall
reply to you, where appropriate, as soon as possible. (The above is
generated by an auto-reply programme to acknowledge receipt of your
message.)

多謝閣下的電子郵件,內容備悉。如有需要,我們會盡快作出回覆。(以上為電腦自動
發出的回覆信息。)

Department of Justice

Dear Sir/Madam,

This is to acknowledge receipt of your email dated 21 December 2021. We
will give you a reply as soon as possible.

Loewe LIU
for Director of Public Prosecutions

show quoted sections

Department of Justice

Dear Sir/Madam,

Our department has received your application for access to information on
21 December 2021.  Your application is now under processing.  According to
paragraph 1.16 of the Code on Access to Information, our department will
inform you of the latest progress of the case separately on or before 10
January 2022.  In the meantime, please contact Ms Loewe LIU at 3902 8048
if you have any enquiry.

Emily HO
for Director of Public Prosecutions

From:        ODPP/DOJ/HKSARG
To:        <[FOI #923 email]>
Date:        23/12/2021 09:25
Subject:        Fw: Freedom of Information request - Historical Statistics
of CSA Cases at DOJ
Sent by:        Heidi SM LAI

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Sir/Madam,

This is to acknowledge receipt of your email dated 21 December 2021. We
will give you a reply as soon as possible.

Loewe LIU
for Director of Public Prosecutions

show quoted sections

Department of Justice

1 Attachment

Dear Ms Edgar,
I refer to your application for access to information dated 21 December
2021, in which you requested the statistical information by year from
January 2010 through December 2021 on child sexual abuse cases charged for
different offences.

Attached is the statistics relevant to the offences listed in your
application.  Your attention is drawn to the remarks in the attachment
regarding the data limitations.

Michael Wong
Senior Assistant Director of Public Prosecutions
(Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions)

From:        ODPP/DOJ/HKSARG
To:        <[FOI #923 email]>
Date:        30/12/2021 10:40
Subject:        Fw: Freedom of Information request - Historical Statistics
of CSA Cases at DOJ
Sent by:        Heidi SM LAI

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Sir/Madam,

Our department has received your application for access to information on
21 December 2021.  Your application is now under processing.  According to
paragraph 1.16 of the Code on Access to Information, our department will
inform you of the latest progress of the case separately on or before 10
January 2022.  In the meantime, please contact Ms Loewe LIU at 3902 8048
if you have any enquiry.

Emily HO
for Director of Public Prosecutions

From:        ODPP/DOJ/HKSARG
To:        <[FOI #923 email]>
Date:        23/12/2021 09:25
Subject:        Fw: Freedom of Information request - Historical Statistics
of CSA Cases at DOJ
Sent by:        Heidi SM LAI

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Sir/Madam,

This is to acknowledge receipt of your email dated 21 December 2021. We
will give you a reply as soon as possible.

Loewe LIU
for Director of Public Prosecutions

show quoted sections

Dear Department of Justice,

Many thanks for your reply, I really appreciate your time and explanatory notes.

The main purpose of our request is to look at sexual crimes against children (under 18 or 16 yrs) and as far as possible some info about the perpetrators. Therefore, I would like to ask some followup questions to get data that pertains to that and to understand the data received:

1. Incest - The criminal code breaks this down in gender of perpetrator (Section 47 incest by men, Section 48 Incest by women of or over 16). Can you please provide the data this way too? If not, why not?

2. Sexual crimes against boys - Please help me to understand which charges relate to minor male victims. There are several crimes specifically aimed at minor females (e.g. Section 124 Intercourse with girl under 16), which crimes relate to boys?

3. Indecency: Please do break out the following "inciting to commit // committing an act of gross indecency // indecent conduct towards / with a child under the age of 16" into their individual charges.

4. Age of the victim - Is not provided. It seems unlikely that it is not recorded since the age of the victim likely effects sentencing and therefore must be recorded. We would like to know the age for several reasons: a) it is currently hard to distinguish which crimes children are victim to when we understand that some Rapes, Buggery, etc. charges are likely involving minor children and b) if possible we would like to understand the effects of crime on certain age groups such as 0-8, 10-13, 14-18.

5. No Charges - Can I just confirm that your records say there were no charges laid for these crimes from 2010-2021?
Section 127 Abduction of unmarried girl under 18 for sexual intercourse
Section 132 Procurement of girl under 21
Section 135 Causing or encouraging prostitution of, intercourse with, or indecent assault on, girl or boy under 16
Section 138A Use, procurement or offer of persons under 18 for making pornography or for live pornographic performances
Section 140 Permitting girl or boy under 13 to resort to or be on premises or vessel for intercourse
Section 141 Permitting young person to resort to or be on premises or vessel for intercourse, prostitution, buggery or homosexual act

6. Other Courts - The data you provided covers the cases prosecuted by in-house counsel or fiat counsel. It does not include those cases prosecuted by court prosecutors attached to magistrates’ courts. Who can we contact to receive the data from the magistrates' courts?

7. Data by year - The data by year must be held in order for this report to be pulled to the exact dates I requested. Please do provide it broken down by year as requested.

Regards,
Taura Edgar
https://www.talkhongkong.org/

Department of Justice

Thank you very much for the message. The content has been noted. We shall
reply to you, where appropriate, as soon as possible. (The above is
generated by an auto-reply programme to acknowledge receipt of your
message.)

多謝閣下的電子郵件,內容備悉。如有需要,我們會盡快作出回覆。(以上為電腦自動
發出的回覆信息。)

Department of Justice

Dear Ms Edgar,

This is to acknowledge receipt of your email dated 12 January 2022. We
will give you a reply as soon as possible.

Loewe LIU
for Director of Public Prosecutions

show quoted sections

Department of Justice

Dear Ms Edgar,

Our department has received your application for access to information on
12 January 2022.  Your application is now under processing.  According to
paragraph 1.16 of the Code on Access to Information, our department will
inform you of the latest progress of the case separately on or before 31
January 2022.  In the meantime, please contact me at 3902 8048 if you have
any enquiry.

Loewe LIU
for Director of Public Prosecutions

From:        ODPP/DOJ/HKSARG
To:        <[FOI #923 email]>
Date:        13/01/2022 09:11
Subject:        Fw: Freedom of Information request - Historical Statistics
of CSA Cases at DOJ
Sent by:        Heidi SM LAI

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Ms Edgar,

This is to acknowledge receipt of your email dated 12 January 2022. We
will give you a reply as soon as possible.

Loewe LIU
for Director of Public Prosecutions

show quoted sections

Department of Justice

2 Attachments

Dear Ms Edgar,
I refer to your email dated 12 January 2022, raising several follow-up
questions and requests on the statistics provided in our previous reply.

Attached please find a set of revised statistics and a summary of our
response to your follow-up questions and requests.  Your attention is
drawn to the remarks in the attachment regarding the data limitations.

Irene Fan
Senior Assistant Director of Public Prosecutions
(Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions) (Acting)

From:        ODPP/DOJ/HKSARG
To:        <[FOI #923 email]>
Date:        21/01/2022 08:52
Subject:        Fw: Freedom of Information request - Historical Statistics
of CSA Cases at DOJ
Sent by:        Heidi SM LAI

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Ms Edgar,

Our department has received your application for access to information on
12 January 2022.  Your application is now under processing.  According to
paragraph 1.16 of the Code on Access to Information, our department will
inform you of the latest progress of the case separately on or before 31
January 2022.  In the meantime, please contact me at 3902 8048 if you have
any enquiry.

Loewe LIU
for Director of Public Prosecutions

From:        ODPP/DOJ/HKSARG
To:        <[FOI #923 email]>
Date:        13/01/2022 09:11
Subject:        Fw: Freedom of Information request - Historical Statistics
of CSA Cases at DOJ
Sent by:        Heidi SM LAI

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Ms Edgar,

This is to acknowledge receipt of your email dated 12 January 2022. We
will give you a reply as soon as possible.

Loewe LIU
for Director of Public Prosecutions

show quoted sections

Department of Justice

Thank you very much for the message. The content has been noted. We shall
reply to you, where appropriate, as soon as possible. (The above is
generated by an auto-reply programme to acknowledge receipt of your
message.)

多謝閣下的電子郵件,內容備悉。如有需要,我們會盡快作出回覆。(以上為電腦自動
發出的回覆信息。)

Dear Department of Justice,

Many thanks again for your document "Number of charges laid for different offences from January 2010 to December 2021" related to sexual offences. May we please know the length of custodial sentences handed down for these offenses related to children (<18yrs)?

attempting to make child pornography
gross indecency with a man under the age of 21
incitement to the offences relating to child pornography
inciting to commit //
committing an act of gross indecency //
indecent conduct towards / with a child under the age of 16
publishing / possession of / making a child pornography
unlawful sexual intercourse with a girl under 13
unlawful sexual intercourse with a girl under 16

Best regards,
Taura Edgar
www.talkhongkong.org

Department of Justice

Thank you very much for the message. The content has been noted. We shall
reply to you, where appropriate, as soon as possible. (The above is
generated by an auto-reply programme to acknowledge receipt of your
message.)

多謝閣下的電子郵件,內容備悉。如有需要,我們會盡快作出回覆。(以上為電腦自動
發出的回覆信息。)

Department of Justice

Dear Ms Edgar,

This is to acknowledge receipt of your email dated 23 May 2022. We will
give you a reply as soon as possible.

Loewe LIU
for Director of Public Prosecutions

show quoted sections

Department of Justice

Dear Ms Edgar,
I refer to your application for access to information dated 23 May 2022.

Kindly be informed that the Department of Justice does not maintain
statistics on the length of custodial sentences for individual categories
of offences as requested.

Irene Fan
Senior Assistant Director of Public Prosecutions
(Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions) (Acting)

From:        ODPP/DOJ/HKSARG
To:        <[FOI #923 email]>
Date:        24/05/2022 10:34
Subject:        Fw: Freedom of Information request - Historical Statistics
of CSA Cases at DOJ
Sent by:        Heidi SM LAI

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Ms Edgar,

This is to acknowledge receipt of your email dated 23 May 2022. We will
give you a reply as soon as possible.

Loewe LIU
for Director of Public Prosecutions

show quoted sections

Dear Department of Justice,

Thanks for letting us know. Do you maintain any information about custodial sentences even if not for individual offences - perhaps as a group such as sexual offenses? If yes, please provide them broken down by year 2010-2021.

The HKLRC's "Sentencing and related matters in the review of sexual offences" Report references Dr Hui's views that those convicted of specified offences (including rape, bestiality and indecent
assault) and sentenced to imprisonment for two years or more "constitutes less than 20% of all sex offenders admitted to correctional institutions." Where do they gather this data about the sentencing period?

Best regards,
Taura Edgar

Department of Justice

Thank you very much for the message. The content has been noted. We shall
reply to you, where appropriate, as soon as possible. (The above is
generated by an auto-reply programme to acknowledge receipt of your
message.)

多謝閣下的電子郵件,內容備悉。如有需要,我們會盡快作出回覆。(以上為電腦自動
發出的回覆信息。)

Department of Justice

Dear Ms Edgar,

This is to acknowledge receipt of your email dated 31 May 2022. We will
give you a reply as soon as possible.

Emily HO
for Director of Public Prosecutions

show quoted sections

Department of Justice

Dear Ms Edgar,

Our department has received your application for access to information on
31 May 2022.  Your application is now under processing.  According to
paragraph 1.16 of the Code on Access to Information, our department will
inform you of the latest progress of the case separately on or before 20
June 2022.  In the meantime, please contact me at 3902 8048 if you have
any enquiry.

Emily HO
for Director of Public Prosecutions

From:        ODPP/DOJ/HKSARG
To:        <[FOI #923 email]>
Date:        31/05/2022 15:14
Subject:        Fw: Freedom of Information request - Historical Statistics
of CSA Cases at DOJ
Sent by:        Heidi SM LAI

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Ms Edgar,

This is to acknowledge receipt of your email dated 31 May 2022. We will
give you a reply as soon as possible.

Emily HO
for Director of Public Prosecutions

show quoted sections

Department of Justice

Dear Ms Edgar,

I refer to your email dated 31 May 2022 to the Department of Justice.

Regarding the first part of your enquiry, kindly be informed that we do
not maintain statistics on the custodial sentences for sexual offences.

As regards the second part of your enquiry, we note that you are referring
to the observations of Dr Judy Hui (Senior Clinical Psychologist of the
Correctional Services Department).  See paragraphs 2.3 and 2.47 of the
Consultation Paper on Sentencing and Related Matters in the Review of
Sexual Offences (published in November 2020).  Please be informed that we
do not have the information requested.  You may wish to approach the
Correctional Services Department directly for more information in that
regard.

Irene Fan
Senior Assistant Director of Public Prosecutions
(Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions) (Acting)

From:        ODPP/DOJ/HKSARG
To:        <[FOI #923 email]>
Date:        09/06/2022 08:50
Subject:        Fw: Freedom of Information request - Historical Statistics
of CSA Cases at DOJ
Sent by:        Heidi SM LAI

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Ms Edgar,

Our department has received your application for access to information on
31 May 2022.  Your application is now under processing.  According to
paragraph 1.16 of the Code on Access to Information, our department will
inform you of the latest progress of the case separately on or before 20
June 2022.  In the meantime, please contact me at 3902 8048 if you have
any enquiry.

Emily HO
for Director of Public Prosecutions

From:        ODPP/DOJ/HKSARG
To:        <[FOI #923 email]>
Date:        31/05/2022 15:14
Subject:        Fw: Freedom of Information request - Historical Statistics
of CSA Cases at DOJ
Sent by:        Heidi SM LAI

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Ms Edgar,

This is to acknowledge receipt of your email dated 31 May 2022. We will
give you a reply as soon as possible.

Emily HO
for Director of Public Prosecutions

show quoted sections

Dear Department of Justice,

Thank you very much for answering and we appreciate the suggestion!

Regards,
Taura Edgar

Department of Justice

Thank you very much for the message. The content has been noted. We shall
reply to you, where appropriate, as soon as possible. (The above is
generated by an auto-reply programme to acknowledge receipt of your
message.)

多謝閣下的電子郵件,內容備悉。如有需要,我們會盡快作出回覆。(以上為電腦自動
發出的回覆信息。)