Table 8
Decisions and outcomes of adult criminal court cases linked to police-reported incidents of online child sexual exploitation and physical assault, by selected characteristics, Canada, 2014 to 2021

Table 8
Decisions and outcomes of adult criminal court cases linked to police-reported incidents of online child sexual exploitation and physical assault, by selected characteristics, Canada, 2014 to 2021
Table summary
This table displays the results of Decisions and outcomes of adult criminal court cases linked to police-reported incidents of online child sexual exploitation and physical assault, by selected characteristics, Canada, 2014 to 2021. The information is grouped by Selected characteristic (appearing as row headers), Physical assault1, Guilty decision, Online child sexual exploitation, Completed court cases2 and Sentenced to custody, calculated using percent3, percent, median length4 and number units of measure (appearing as column headers).
Selected characteristic Online child sexual exploitation Physical assault Table 8 Note 1
Completed court cases Table 8 Note 2 Guilty decision Sentenced to custody Completed court cases Table 8 Note 2 Guilty decision Sentenced to custody
number percent number percent Table 8 Note 3 median length Table 8 Note 4 number percent number percent Table 8 Note 3 median length Table 8 Note 4
Note ...

not applicable

Note 1

Physical assault includes assault (levels 1, 2, 3), unlawfully causing bodily harm, and other assaults where a victim was identified as being 17 years of age or younger at the start of the incident and where physical assault was the most serious violation in the incident.

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Note 2

The data file used for analysis includes all completed court cases between 2013/2014 and 2022/2023 for incidents reported by police between 2014 and 2021. Includes cases where an online child sexual exploitation (OCSE)/physical assault charge laid by police was retained through the court process. The charge was not necessarily the most serious offence in the case.

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Note 3

Percent calculations exclude cases that resulted in a decision of guilt but the sentencing detail was unknown.

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Note 4

Length in days. Excludes indeterminate sentences and sentences of unknown length. Excludes sentences of 0 days, which may reflect remaining time in sentenced custody after credit for pre-trial time served, or may be a sentence of unknown length. The median represents the midpoint of all sentences once sorted from lowest to highest.

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Note 5

Victim characteristics include incidents with a single victim, where victim gender was known and victim age was 17 years or younger at the start of the incident. Excludes online child pornography incidents.

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Note 6

Includes biological, step, adoptive and foster parents. Includes all other family members related by blood, marriage (including common-law) or adoption (e.g., siblings, children, grandchildren, nieces, nephews and in-laws).

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Note 7

Includes current and former legally married spouses, common-law partners and dating partners (i.e., boyfriends, girlfriends), and other intimate partners (e.g., one-night stands). Victims of spousal violence include those aged 15 years and older, and victims of dating violence include those aged 12 years and older.

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Note 8

Includes neighbours, roommates, reverse authority figures (i.e., student-to-teacher, patient-to-doctor), business relationships and criminal relationships (i.e., relationships based on illegal activities).

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Note 9

Reflects the charges laid by police and not necessarily the charges that were processed in court. While court cases may not have proceeded with the same charges initially laid or recommended by police, all cases involve incidents where at least one online child sexual exploitation/physical assault charge was retained in court.

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Note 10

Represents youth who were tried in adult criminal court.

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Note: Includes cases completed in adult criminal court only, due to fundamental differences in approach and sentencing between adult and youth courts. Characteristics are based on what was reported by police. Since one court case can be linked to multiple victims and incidents, the characteristics presented in this table reflect all court cases that successfully linked to a police-reported online child sexual exploitation (OCSE)/ physical assault incident where at least one OCSE/ physical assault charge was retained in court. As a result, there can be overlap between categories as the same victim or incident may have linked to more than one court case, or one court case may have linked to more than one incident or victim.
Source: Statistics Canada, Canadian Centre for Justice and Community Safety Statistics, Uniform Crime Reporting Survey and Integrated Criminal Courts Survey (linked file).
Victim characteristic Table 8 Note 5  
Gender of victim  
Victim was a girl 457 328 72 249 84 180 8,797 4,170 47 820 21 30
Victim was a boy 60 42 70 30 79 365 8,159 4,096 50 721 18 60
Age group of victim  
Victim was a child (aged 0 to 11 years) 49 34 69 25 83 365 4,669 2,376 51 358 16 84
Victim was a youth (aged 12 to 17 years) 470 337 72 254 84 180 12,310 5,898 48 1,184 21 33
Accused-victim relationship  
Family (Parent, sibling, other family) Table 8 Note 6 80 49 61 33 75 365 8,225 3,847 47 531 15 60
Spouse, common-law, dating or other intimate partner Table 8 Note 7 35 23 66 14 67 270 3,121 1,537 49 388 26 30
Friend 23 20 87 10 71 365 401 221 55 49 24 50
Casual acquaintance 164 116 71 89 86 180 2,469 1,266 51 259 21 56
Authority figure 32 24 75 16 76 90 503 213 42 29 14 90
Stranger 138 104 75 85 87 231 1,844 985 53 248 26 45
Other Table 8 Note 8 23 16 70 13 93 309 408 201 49 38 20 44
Unknown 24 19 79 19 100 180 9 5 56 1 20 43
Incident characteristic  
Violation Table 8 Note 9  
Luring 867 618 71 487 87 180 ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable
Non-consensual distribution of intimate images 22 13 59 4 31 225 ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable
Invitation to sexual touching 294 207 70 171 90 287 ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable
Other online sexual offences against children 285 187 66 137 82 346 ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable
Possessing or accessing child pornography 713 527 74 447 90 240 ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable
Making or distributing child pornography 516 385 75 309 90 365 ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable
Aggravated assault (level 3) ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable 733 464 63 242 55 235
Assault with a weapon or causing bodily harm (level 2) ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable 9,467 5,411 57 1,551 30 60
Common assault (level 1) ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable ... not applicable 18,121 8,751 48 1,510 18 30
Accused characteristic  
Gender of accused  
Accused was a man or boy 62 33 53 24 73 365 6,851 2,941 43 320 11 33
Accused was a woman or girl 2,633 1,903 72 1,531 88 270 21,528 11,724 54 2,999 27 60
Age of accused  
12 to 17 years Table 8 Note 10 7 1 14 1 100 90 47 11 23 1 9 1
18 to 24 years 571 392 69 303 84 180 8,861 4,828 54 1,239 27 45
25 to 44 years 1,387 1,005 72 801 88 294 14,309 7,516 53 1,757 25 60
45 to 64 years 637 470 74 394 92 360 4,918 2,218 45 318 15 60
65 years and older 95 69 73 56 89 300 262 101 39 4 4 10
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