2025/01/21 by Dan Whitten, Eleanor Neyroud, Peter Neyroud · 1 voice
Social Sciences · Environmental Science · #Criminal Justice and Corrections Analysis #Wildlife Conservation and Criminology Analyses #Crime Patterns and Interventions
paper · pdf · doi:10.1007/s41887-024-00097-6
openalex publication_date 2025/01/21 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/29
Abstract Research question Sexual Risk Orders (SRO) have been advocated as a means to prevent Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG). This is despite significant detriment to the fundamental rights of the legally innocent and a lack of empirical assessment that can speak to preventative efficacy. This study asks; do SROs serve to prevent sexual-harm? Data The Police National Computer (PNC) was used to identify two samples of SRO subjects. Legal Services’ data from the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) was used to construct a counterfactual group, for whom SRO was considered but not obtained. PNC was used to identify arrests as a proxy for offending and a harm index applied. Methods Before-after and between-group comparisons are used, along with an interrupted-time-series analysis, to assess the relationship between SRO and sexual-harm prevention. Rank-ordering of harm caused by alleged sexual-offenders in London enables an estimate of how precisely SROs are used against the highest-harm offenders. Findings SROs are associated with a significant 84.5% reduction in sexual-harm. This increases to a 93.1% reduction in the case of high-harm offenders, controlling for time incarcerated. Despite this, SROs are rarely used and are not systematically targeted against the most harmful offenders. Conclusions Within the limitations of the methodology we conclude that the evidence supports SRO use as a primary tactic to counter VAWG. Preventative impact may be maximised by increasing use, actively targeting SROs at the highest-harm offenders and considering use at an earlier stage of a subjects sexual-offending. A randomised trial is the next logical step to augment causal inference.