More than 60,000 inmates are sexually abused every year, according to a report being made public Tuesday by the National Prison Rape Elimination Commission. The eight-member panel was formed under the 2003 Prison Rape Elimination Act.

Based on a 2007 survey of tens of thousands of incarcerated people, 4.5 percent of those surveyed reported being sexually abused in the previous 12 months – and more prisoners claimed abuse by staff than by other inmates.

Among the key findings of the report aimed at reducing the amount of rape, sexual assault and sexual abuse behind bars, the panel found:

- Who gets abused depends a great deal on where they are incarcerated. Ten facilities studied had high rates, between 9 percent and almost 16 percent, whereas six facilities reported no abuse at all for the past year. The commission said prison management must show leadership in stopping such abuse.

- Inmates in jails reported fewer instances of rape than in prisons.

- Inmates who were short, young, gay or female were more likely to be victimized than other inmates.

To fight the problem, the commission says prison authorities should adopt more internal monitoring and external oversight. They also say prison officials need to improve investigation of claims of sexual assault and rape, because currently many victims cannot safely and easily come forward.

After the prison rape report is sent to Congress, the attorney general is to create new national standards for detecting and preventing rape and sexual assault in prisons, jails and detention facilities.

Rape already is a major problem in South Africa.  The report, by ActionAid, found that almost half of all South African women will be raped in their lifetimes.  Each year there are about a half million rapes committed in the country and of every 25 men charged only one is convicted.

But the ActionAid report said the situation is particularly dire for lesbians, especially in the Black townships in Cape Town and Johannesburg.

“So-called ‘corrective’ rape is yet another grotesque manifestation of violence against women, the most widespread human rights violation in the world today,” ActionAid head Zanele Twala told the Agence France Press.

More than three dozen lesbians have been reported murdered in homophobic attacks over the last decade, but only one case has led to a conviction, the report said, adding that the actual number of rapes is likely much higher.

The study noted that one women’s support group in Cape Town is responding to 10 new cases of “corrective rape” every week in that city alone.

In 2007, Sizakele Sigasa, 30, an outreach coordinator at the Positive Women’s Network and a lesbian and gay rights activist, and her friend Salome Masooa, 23, were tortured and murdered in Soweto.

Sigasa was found with her hands tied with her underpants and her ankles tied with her shoelaces, with three bullet holes in her head and three in her collarbone.

Masooa also had been shot to death. Both women were raped before being killed.

So far there have been no arrests.

TheActionAid report also said that even though the South African Constitution enshrines LGBT civil rights, there is no hate crime law protecting the community.

Lawyers for Humberto Hernandez Salvador, 31, Josue Gonzalez, 21, and Darrell Hodges, 16, entered the pleas to charges that include kidnapping, carjacking, gang rape and sodomy in the Dec. 13 attack in Richmond, about 15 miles northeast of San Francisco.

Salvador also was charged with committing a hate crime, and his lawyer said he was also pleaded not guilty to that.

A 15-year-old boy also accused in the attack has been charged as a juvenile in the case, but prosecutors are reviewing whether to charge him as an adult, like they did with Hodges.

Authorities say the woman was taunted for being a lesbian during the 45-minute assault, which started as she was walking to the Richmond apartment she shared with a partner and their 8-year-old daughter. Besides being beaten and sexually assaulted in the street, the woman was forced back into her car and assaulted at an abandoned apartment building where she was left without clothes, according to police.

The case has sparked protests and an outpouring of support for the woman, who turns 29 on Friday and has been too traumatized to go back to her apartment or use her car.

“She got beaten pretty bad and has a major medical situation around that, and she can’t work,” said Tallon Nunez, a Bay Area resident who has been raising money for the woman and acting as her spokeswoman. “Suddenly they are relying on one income that was not that much to start with,”

Salvador, Gonzalez and Hodges remain jailed on bails ranging from $1.9 million and $2.2 million, and are due back in court in March.

Humberto Hernandez Salvador, 31, and Josue Gonzalez, 21, were charged with kidnapping, carjacking and gang rape in the attack last month in Richmond.

Hate-crime enhancements were added to charges against Salvador, which could mean a more severe sentence if he is convicted. Authorities say the woman was taunted for being a lesbian during the 45-minute assault. Salvador was also charged with being armed with a gun.

The pair did not enter pleas when they appeared in Contra Costa County Superior Court, but they asked to be represented by court-appointed attorneys. Bail was set at $2.2 million for Salvador and $1.9 million for Gonzalez. Both were being held at the county jail.

They face a maximum sentence of life in prison if found guilty, prosecutors said.

Darrell Hodges, 16, was charged as an adult with similar offenses Monday. A 15-year-old boy whose name has not been released was also arrested last week on suspicion of participating in the attack.

The woman, who lives with a female partner, was attacked Dec. 13 after she got out of her car, according to investigators. She was raped multiple times inside and outside the vehicle and left naked outside an abandoned building, police said.

Richmond police say they have received hundreds of calls from across the country offering money and support for the woman.

“The crimes that were committed at face value were shocking,” Lt. Mark Gagan said. “But when it was revealed there was also a hate crime enhancement, it really prompted outcry.”

Richmond is a city of about 100,000 across the bay from San Francisco, It has one of California’s highest homicide rates.

Gay rights advocates and bloggers have highlighted the attack as an example of violence against gays and lesbians. Supporters have also been working to raise money for the woman, her partner and her daughter as they deal with the trauma of the attack.

“The idea that a peace-loving lesbian was minding her own business, was attacked and gang-raped is an outrage. And people are stepping forward,” said Betty Sullivan of San Francisco, who runs a Web site and e-mail list publicizing gay and lesbian events.

Sullivan is publicizing several fundraisers for the woman, known among her supporters as Richmond Jane Doe. Support is driven not just by anger but by a sense among gays and lesbians that they, too, could have been targets, she said.

“We know it could have been any of us,” Sullivan said.

Officers arrested Humberto Hernandez Salvador at his Richmond home, Richmond police Lt. Mark Gagan said. The 31-year-old is being held without bail on gang rape, kidnapping and carjacking charges.

Police also arrested a 15-year-old Richmond boy and a 16-year-old Hercules boy, who were being held at a juvenile detention center on similar charges. Their names were not released.

Josue Gonzalez, 21, turned himself in after police announced they were searching for him. He was wanted on charges of gang rape, kidnapping and carjacking.

Gagan said Gonzalez asked for an attorney when he turned himself in but said nothing about his alleged role in the attack.

“We feel that while these four suspects were at large, a large cross-section of our population felt unsafe,” Gagan said. “Now that the fourth one is behind bars, we can all breathe a sigh of relief.”

Police would not detail each person’s alleged involvement. Tips from local residents led to the arrests.

Detectives say the 28-year-old victim was attacked on Dec. 13 after she got out of her car, which bore a rainbow gay pride sticker. The alleged attackers made comments indicating they knew she was a lesbian, police said.

Authorities have characterized the case as a hate crime. Police said the victim lives openly with a female partner.

The 45-minute attack started when one of the men approached the woman in the street, struck her with a blunt object, ordered her to disrobe and sexually assaulted her with the help of the others, according to detectives.

When the group saw another person approaching, they forced the victim back into her car and took her to a burned-out apartment building. She was raped again inside and outside the vehicle and left naked outside the building while the alleged assailants took her wallet and drove off in her car, police said.

(Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) A 43-year-old suburban Philadelphia man will spend the rest of his life behind bars for the murder of a 23-year-old intern he had attempted to rape.

William Smithson could have been sentenced to death by lethal injection for the murder of Jason Kyle Shephard two years ago. 

In addition to finding Smithson guilty of murder, the jury also convicted him of attempted rape, kidnapping and drug charges.

Shephard’s body was found Smithson’s home in September 2006. The 23-year-old from Cavalier, North Dakota was studying sports marketing at Northern State University in Aberdeen, South Dakota and had taken a semester off to intern at Daktronics, a scoreboard manufacturer.

Smithson was a supervisor for a Daktronics office in Pennsylvania when Shephard visited the office in the summer of 2006.

During Smithson’s trial, the jury was told that on the night of his murder, Shephard had called several friends from his hotel room before Smithson picked him up and brought him to his house.

Prosecutor Thomas Lawrie said Smithson slipped the date-rape drug GHB into a drink and gave it to Shephard. He then began undressing the young man.

Lawrie said that Shephard was partially conscious and put up a fight. Smithson then punched Shephard in the face and strangled him. Smithson then hid the body in the basement and attempted to conceal the murder.

Smithson, testifying in his own defense, said that he had trouble coming to terms with his sexuality and as a result had developed a drug habit. He also admitted that he had hosted drug-induced sex parties that involved Washington lobbyists and New York doctors.

He told the jury that during the parties he frequently injected and snorted crystal meth.

In his closing arguments, Lawrie called Smithson’s home a “domicile of degradation.”

During the penalty phase of trial, Shephard’s father said the young man had been studying to be a teacher and was an avid runner.

“He was the core of our family,” said Kyle Shephard.

Smithson’s attorney pleaded for the jury not to impose the death penalty. “Let him live,” urged Mary Beth Welch.

In returning with a life sentence the jury, indicated that despite the severity of the crime, Smithson was emotional instable because of his drug addiction and did not have a criminal record prior to the murder.

Smithson will be formally sentenced in January.