False allegations of rape (FOI ref: 2575A/25)

Request

Please provide the following information for each of the past ten calendar years (2016–2025 inclusive, or the most recent years for which data is held):

1. The number of women investigated by your force for making a false allegation of rape, where the suspected offence was perverting the course of justice (or wasting police time).

2. The number of women charged with perverting the course of justice (or wasting police time, if relevant) in relation to allegedly false rape allegations.

3. The number of resulting prosecutions for these offences.

4. For each prosecution, please provide the outcome (guilty, not guilty, charges dropped/no further action).

5. For each conviction, please provide:

• The sentence imposed (e.g. custodial, suspended, community order)
• The length of any custodial sentence.

If possible, please provide this data in an annual breakdown.

Response

Please see as follows but note - due to system changes/issues we are only able to conduct searches for relevant data from 01 April 2021.

1. The number of women investigated by your force for making a false allegation of rape, where the suspected offence was perverting the course of justice (or wasting police time).

2021 (from 01 April) = 1

2022 = 2

2023 = 0

2024 = 2

2025 (to 30 November) = 0

2. The number of women charged with perverting the course of justice (or wasting police time, if relevant) in relation to allegedly false rape allegations.

0

3. The number of resulting prosecutions for these offences.

Not applicable (see answer to question 2 above).

4. For each prosecution, please provide the outcome (guilty, not guilty, charges dropped/no further action).

Not applicable (see answer to question 2 above).

5. For each conviction, please provide:

• The sentence imposed (e.g. custodial, suspended, community order)
• The length of any custodial sentence.

Not applicable (see answer to question 2 above).

Every effort is made to ensure that the figures presented are accurate and complete. However, it is important to note that this data has been extracted from a number of data sources used by forces for police purposes. The detail collected to respond specifically to your request may be subject to the inaccuracies inherent in any large scale recording system. As a consequence, care should be taken to ensure data collection processes and their inevitable limitations are taken into account when interpreting the data.

The figures provided therefore are our best interpretation of data which has relevance to your request, but you should be aware that the collation of figures for ad hoc requests may have limitations and this should be taken into account when those data are used.

If you decide to write an article / use the enclosed data we would ask you to take into consideration the factors highlighted in this document so as to not mislead members of the public or official bodies, or misrepresent the relevance of the whole or any part of this disclosed material.