Female Offenders as Victims of Gendered Violence by Officers of the Nigeria Police

In the mainstream media and sociological research, the issues of police brutality and use of force have remained prevalent. However, in spite of the appreciable attention given to police brutality against male citizens in international headlines and scholarly research, female victims have been relatively ignored. The aim of this paper is to explore the experience of female offenders with the police from the point of arrest through custody. Using a mixed-method research design, participants were drawn from inmates of the Female Maximum and Medium Security Prison, Lagos. One hundred and eighty-six respondents completed questionnaires, while 27 interviews were conducted. Findings indicate that participants were subjected to a variety of physical, emotional, and sexual violence, including torture, sexual assault and intimidation, denials of essential needs, and unwarranted punishments. The pervasion of violence and abuse by police officers on female detainees is one of the consequences of the perennial deficiencies of Nigeria police to carry out intelligence-based investigation. The increase in well-trained female personnel, gender-sensitive treatment of suspects and offenders, capacity building on intelligence-based investigation, effective human right awareness, regulation and proper monitoring of officers, enhancement of professionalism, adequate funding, and provision of logistics and equipment are suggested.