Upskirting is a gateway to more serious sexual offences, according to a growing body of evidence, the Sussex police and crime commissioner said.
Katy Bourne asked Deputy Chief Constable Paul Court about upskirting during a series of questions about crime figures at a “performance and accountability meeting” yesterday (Thursday 18 June).
The number of reports of upskirting offences across Sussex has remained stable since the act of secretly taking photographs or videos up women’s skirts became a specific offence in 2019.
Mr Court said that, in the year to May, there were 17 reports – and 16 in the previous year. These figures were lower than the year to May 2024 when there were 21 reports.
He said: “Broadly, they are in the same order of magnitude in terms of numbers. Those numbers are a very low number of offences being reported to us.”
Mrs Bourne asked whether he would have expected the number to have been higher. Mr Court said that the number felt low to him, compared with the volume of other offences.
Mrs Bourne said that it was a “gateway offence” to violence against woman and girls. She said: “There is growing evidence that upskirting is a bit like indecent exposure.
“It’s a gateway offence, often to more serious crimes, particularly against woman and girls, violence and that whole genre.”
She asked if there was any work under way to see if those who had committed upskirting had moved on to more serious crime.
Mr Court said that electronic devices such as phones were searched on arrest and intelligence checks were carried out on them.
The sex offender unit also checked for offending patterns and any escalation in offenders’ behaviour.
When offenders were convicted, they were added to the sex offenders register, tracked and monitored.
Intelligence was recorded on Sussex Police systems and shared with a national police database, he added.
