8.2 Prevalence of assault on LGBTI persons Displacement 4% TOTAL DISTRIBUTION OF VIOLATIONS Blackmail 13% Unfair Labour Practice 2% Hate Speech 1% Assault 18% Transgender 22% Threat 15% Police Harrassment 8% Disownment 7% Outed 11% Invasion of Privacy 7% 2017 Mixed 9% Lesbian 19% Discrimination 7% Detention 7% Assault Assault Intersex 0% Bi-Sexual 0% 2016 2015 2014 Gay 50% 2013 2012 0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 Assault has been the most prevalent category of violations of LGBTI persons, recorded over the period under review. About 20% of all the cases documented in the five reports have some form of assault. It is worrying that many of the cases have gone unreported and the perpetrators have not been brought to account for their actions. The reluctance to report cases of assault to law enforcement is generally influenced by other categories of violations discussed later in this analysis, which are Police Harassment and Detention. It was noted in some cases that, when an LGBTI person attempts to report assault to the police, often the focus would shift from the assault as the reported case to the sexual orientation or gender identity of the complainant. This discouraged many LGBTI persons from reporting assault, fearing stigmatization, humiliation and in some cases arrest and detention themselves. Assault on LGBTI people took place in different contexts, though mostly in public spaces such as bars, commuter taxi ranks or gatherings. It would appear that vulnerability to assault was greatest where LGBTI are in the presence of a crowd, which would depend on the strength of the large numbers to initiate an attack. GALZ events were also targeted by homophobic mobs, who would most likely be acting on a tip off by either the venue staff or a member of the association attending the event. A notable number of assault incidents also took place in the neighborhoods of the LGBTI persons, wherein following a tip off, mobs would gather out side the houses of the LGBTI persons and attack, more often than not resulting in eviction orders from the landlords. Another trend observed, involves police officers taking the law into their own hands and verbally and physically attacking LGBTI persons. Such occurrences were recorded as happening at police stations while the complainants were in custody and in public spaces. An analysis of the state of human rights violations against LGBTI persons in Zimbabwe (2011-2017) 19