Sexual violence happens in all communities, big or small. To compare apples to apples, you need to examine successful prosecution rates*, or the number of convictions relative to population size. Here’s how Minnesota counties compare when it comes to prosecuting sexual violence**.

Counties Over 250,000 in Population

Counties 50,000-250,000 in Population

Counties 20,000-50,000 in Population

Counties Under 20,000 in Population

* NOTE: The rankings above compare the number of successful prosecutions to population size to derive the rate at which counties are prosecuting sexual violence. A complete prosecution rate would include cases that resulted in acquittals (not-guilty dispositions). This rate should not be confused with the common use of “conviction rate,” which merely indicates what percent of those cases a prosecutor chose to pursue (whether many or few) resulted in a conviction.

** NOTE: The tables above show sentencing patterns for Criminal Sexual Conduct (all victims). Because these crimes cover the largest grouping of sex crimes, including rape and child sexual abuse, we have used them as the strongest indicator of each county’s response to sexual violence crimes.