Boom in family abuse, growing crimes against minors: almost 7,000 in 2023

Mistreatment in the family, sexual violence, abandonment, violation of family care obligations, sexual acts with minors. These are hateful, repugnant, intolerable crimes that affect minors in Italy. Data from the Criminal Analysis Service of the Central Directorate of the Criminal Police for Terre des Hommes' "Indifesa" campaign show that in 2023 crimes against minors numbered almost 7,000, exactly 6,952, an average of 19 per day. Crimes increased by 35% in ten years and even by 89% since 2006. The data were released by the Terre des Hommes Foundation at the Chamber of Deputies - in the presence of the President of the Chamber of Deputies, Lorenzo Fontana, the Deputy Quaestor of the State Police, Eugenia Sepe, and Carla Garlatti, the Guarantor Authority for Childhood and Adolescence - on the occasion of the presentation of the Dossier indifesa "The condition of girls and young women in the world" 2024 and in view of the International Day of the Girl Child on 11 October.

It is girls who are most affected by crimes against minors: in 61% of cases, in fact, they are the victims. And it is mainly sexual crimes that increase this percentage: starting with sexual violence and aggravated sexual violence, with 89% and 85% female victims respectively, moving on to sexual acts with minors (79% of victims are female), possession of pornographic material and corruption of minors (both with 78% female victims), up to prostitution and child pornography (in both of which 64% of victims are girls).

Voluntary manslaughter (67%), abandonment of minors or incapacitated persons (61%), abuse of the means of corruption or discipline (59%) and abduction of incapacitated persons (55%) have the majority of male victims. Victims are in parity in the crimes of violation of family care obligations (both genders 50%) and ill-treatment in the family or towards children (female victims 51%).

"The data show an increase in reports from victims. This means that the actions taken by the Police Force on the front of information campaigns, aimed at breaking down the socio-cultural obstacles that have fuelled and still fuel violence and abuse against minors, are producing results that confirm the relationship of trust established with the victims," explains Eugenia Sepe, deputy police commissioner. "A result," Sepe explained during a video interview with Il Sole 24 Ore, "that does not distract our gaze from the 'dark number' of unreported cases and from all those crimes that take place in the 'virtual world' where minors are increasingly exposed and defenceless".

Paolo Ferrara, Director General of Terre des Hommes, highlighted two factors that emerge from the data: 'Firstly, the image of the family as a safe and welcoming place, as a nest in which children can grow up to learn to take flight, shows more than one crack and calls into question all our efforts so that parents do not have to face in solitude a fragility that appears increasingly evident. Secondly, violence, especially physical violence, continues to take place, for the most part, on the bodies of girls and young women, and this, we will never tire of saying it, compels all of us not to give up on a cultural battle to overcome the patriarchal structure and create a more inclusive society based on respect for others, which is still far from producing the hoped-for changes'.