Nearly one in three reports of sexual assault in Penticton are labelled as “unfounded” by RCMP before a formal investigation is opened, according to a recent report.

The Globe and Mail spent 20 months investigating the way sexual assault claims are processed, finding a national average of 19 per cent of sexual assault reports over five years are dismissed by police before the crime can even be counted by Stats Canada.

The report includes an online tool that allows the public to look up the data for over 870 police forces across Canada. The number of “unfounded” sexual assault reports ranges between B.C.’s 11 per cent to New Brunswick’s 32 per cent.

Because the decision relies entirely on the officer speaking to the complainant, specific detachments vary even more widely, with some detachments hitting as high as 50 per cent and others low as 6 per cent.

In B.C., the vast majority of RCMP detachments and police forces land below a 20-per-cent rate, while the Penticton RCMP reportedly files away 31 per cent of sexual assault cases as “unfounded”. That’s 86 out of 281 cases between 2011 and 2014.

“It’s alarming and sad that Penticton has such a high per cent of unfounded sexual assault rates,” said South Okanagan Victim Assistance Society resource development co-ordinator Amberlee Erdmann. “I just think about the individuals that build up the courage to report the sexual assault crime and how brave they are to go and share, and that process of sharing can be extremely re-traumatizing.”

In the rural areas surrounding Penticton, the rate is closer to 14 per cent. Similarly, Osoyoos and Oliver were at 16 and nine per cent respectively, while the various detachments serving metropolitan Kelowna – including municipal Kelowna, West Kelowna and rural Kelowna – range between 11 and 20 per cent.

Staff Sgt. Kirsten Marshall says a national review is currently underway for similar stats for 2016, and says she can’t speak to  numbers until they are released by the RCMP. She pointed to a statement by the national RCMP, which notes that its policies are in constant review and face regular revisions.