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The Real SVU: sexual abuse and the
detectives who investigate it.
By Greg Brown


Sexual Abuse is any sexuality, sexual contact, or any explicit sexual reference with a child or a "vulnerable adult". This includes unconcealed sexual behavior by an adult or older child that is intended to provide either sexual gratification of the abuser, or gratification of achieving a sense of power and control over another individual, using sex as the medium. This includes kissing, fondling, sexual intercourse, oral sex, and other similar behaviors. In addition, abuse to the person or child may occur through taking pornographic photographs of them, or forcing nudity, prostitution, or other coerced sexual conduct.

Child sexual abuse is a major social problem and it is not going to go away. The true scale of the sexual exploitation of children has yet to be made unmistakably clear. Perfect statistics are improbable, if not impossible, to achieve because child sexual abuse is a crime that is believed to be severely under-reported. Police and prosecutors say only a small percentage of teen sex crimes actually result in arrest. This is frustrating because most cases that make it to court end in conviction. Even when victims do come forward, they sometimes change their mind after telling their stories to police and refuse to cooperate and/or move forward with prosecution. Or often they delay reporting by days, weeks, or even months, during which time physical evidence has disappeared.

One study showed nearly 20 percent of boys believe it’s OK at least some of the time to force a girl to have sex if she and the boy are “going together” and have had sex in the past. More than 10 percent of boys said it was OK at least some of the time to force a girl to have sex if she was drunk, and close to 15 percent...