"What We Now Know About Female and Juvenile Sex Offenders"

This keynote will examine populations of sex offenders, which are often ignored: female, juvenile and sex offenders. This workshop will examine typologies of female sex offenders, their motivations, modus operandi, and the impact on victims.

Research suggests that female sex offenders differ in important ways from male sex offenders and therefore will likely respond to different treatments. It seems likely that certain types of female sex offenders – those who molest very young children and use high levels of physical violence – rarely come to the attention of law enforcement as sex offenders and are known primarily through retrospective victim accounts. By contrast, another group, called informally the "teacher/lover" group, do get caught more often as their victims are older and not under their control. A third group will also be examined, those who are coerced into offending by male co-perpetrators.