LGBTQ+ Adult Victims of Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault, 2016-2023

June is LGBTQI+ Pride Month, a celebration and recognition of those who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, or another sexual minority (LGBTQ+). To better capture the needs and experiences of LGBTQ+ survivors of violence, InfoNet expanded gender identity to include transgender and genderqueer and added sexual orientation as a data collection field in July 2015.

InfoNet data show that in 2023, 1,611 adult clients with domestic violence (DV) cases self-identified as LGBTQ+, or 5.7% of all adult DV new cases that year. For sexual assault (SA), 790 adult clients self-identified as LGBTQ+, representing 13.8% of all adult SA new client cases in 2023. Data across the last eight years show the percentages of DV or SA adult clients self-identifying as LGBTQ+ has steadily increased, except for a slight decrease in 2020 (Figure 1).