Animal Sexual Assault 79 and intensity of existing treatment programmes are not sufficient for the acute risk associated with these offenders Thereby, recommending longterm, individual and regular professional support which utilises a broad base of therapeutic and psychoeduational support In the absence of dedicated prevention programmes, managing offender risk and reducing recidivism is likely the most effective protection for animals The containment approach is believed to manage this risk effectively (English et al 2003) It involves a multidisciplinary and collaborate strategy based on full disclosure and verification of each individual offender’s specific offending pattern Focus on the individual is important; offenders and offender motivations clearly differ, suggesting responses must target offender types rather than using a broad-brush approach (Maher and Pierpoint 2012) Future treatment for ASA offenders could also follow in the footsteps of the AniCare Model currently available in the US for animal cruelty offenders AniCare is the first professionally developed cognitive behavioural-based intervention programme for adult (and now youth) animal abusers (Shapiro et al 2014), however, this programme is not currently tailored towards ASA abusers Conclusion What is considered as ASA varies—ranging from the narrow, legal definitions of penetration of an animal to others which include touching an animal in a sexual way or using animal pornography For us, the key issue is that animals cannot consent Sexual acts with animals are coercive and harmful As such, any form of ASA is rape There is little consistency in the research findings on the prevalence of ASA (again in its different forms)—ranging from to around 70 % of the populations studied Moreover, the methodological limitations of these studies mean that many of the statistics are likely to be underestimations of the true extent of the crime Official statistics will also underestimate the problem as ASA is a voiceless crime The existing literature furthers our understanding of ASA, proposing a number of explanations as to why individuals engage in this behaviour, as well as categorisations and typologies of the sexual acts and offenders motivations For example, Beirne’s typology includes adolescent sexual experimentation, aggravated cruelty, commercial exploitation and zoophilia, but we also recognise that categories proposed are never exhaustive nor mutually exclusive, and that they often neglect the impact on the animal victim In terms of societal reactions, arguably an effective response to ASA is only