Sexual Assault: Making a Difference Canada

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Making a Difference Canada

Working Together ........ Across Disciplines, Communities, and Countries

The "Making a Difference Canada" initiative is a joint effort with Making a Difference USA, supported with generous funding by the Donner Canadian Foundation in Canada, and by the William H. Donner Foundation in the USA.

The purpose of the "Making a Difference" initiative is to challenge the justice system in both the U.S. and Canada to more effectively prosecute sexual offenders.

Research shows that the criminal justice systems in the U.S. and Canada, as in other countries, are less likely to prosecute incidents of sexual assault if there is relationship between the victim and the accused, there is no sign of physical injury, and the suspect is not otherwise associated with criminal activity. However, these two characteristics are in fact typical for the majority of adult sexual assaults.

In fact, the research demonstrates that:

1. the vast majority of sexual assault crimes are committed by a person who is known to the victim, who is not otherwise associated with criminal activity, and who does not leave any evidence of physical injury on the victim, and
2. that the most frequent type of sexual assault is typically treated with leniency, while atypical sexual assault perpetrators (i.e., those who are strangers, associated with criminal activity, and physically injure their victim) are the ones who are likely to be held accountable for their crimes .

The "Making a Difference" initiative was designed to address this problem, by bringing together multi-disciplinary teams in 8 Canadian and 8 US communities to work collaboratively to improve sexual assault victim support, investigation, and evidence collection, and to facilitate reform in the U.S. and Canadian criminal systems to challenge the status quo and more effectively prosecute incidents of adult sexual assault.

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