Citation

Shackelford TK. J. Crim. Justice 2002; 30(2): 135-141.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2002, Elsevier Publishing)

DOI

10.1016/S0047-2352(01)00131-3

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Previous work inspired by an evolutionary perspective found that reproductive-age females are at special risk for single-offender rape and rape-murder, relative to non-reproductive-age females. The current research replicated and extended these findings to multiple-offender rape-murder. The author obtained access to a national database of homicides and selected for analysis cases in which a female was (a) raped and murdered by at least two males previously unknown to her, or (b) murdered in the context of theft by at least two males previously unknown to her. The results supported an evolutionary psychological hypothesis and refuted a competing routine activities hypothesis, indicating that (a) young men are the primary perpetrators of multiple-offender rape-murder and theft-murder, (b) reproductive-age women are overrepresented among victims of multiple-offender rape-murder, but (c) are underrepresented among the victims of multiple-offender theft-murder. The discussion addresses questions generated by these findings that challenge a simple evolutionary perspective on rape.