ABSTRACT
It is a relatively commonplace belief that the volume of sex offenses has increased markedly during the recent past. Whether such is the case, or perhaps merely an artifact of journalistic attention to sensational cases accelerated by “public awareness” campaigns, might be determined by review and analysis of information contained in such sources as the several Sourcebooks of Criminal Justice Statistics, massive annual compendia of data relating to crime and the operation of the policing, judicial, and correctional systems in the U.S. published by the Federal Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Statistics (Flanagan & Jamieson, 1988; McGarrell & Flanagan, 1985).
