Hate Crimes

Valerie Perez

Hate crimes is a growing concern with a large focus on how to collect accurate and
sufficient data. The United States is home to a wide diversity of people that identify
themselves in many different ways in categories such as religion, sexual identity,
gender, race, culture, etc. With this range of differences, the FBI has taken it on
themselves to protect the rights of each individual. The FBI has worked diligently to
maintain the Uniform Crime Report (UCR) data collection to gather information around
crimes that are prejudice to a specific group of people. In this essay I will discuss the
top three reasons that are currently causing concerns about the accuracy of the hate
crime data being collected. These three topics are a main concern of many, the difficulty
of proving a hate crime, the unwillingness of victims to report such crimes, and the
inconsistency between states around hate crime laws.

Hate Crimes are “as defined by the FBI, a hate crime is a violent or property crime –
such as murder, arson, assault or vandalism – that is “motivated in whole or in part by
an offender’s bias against a race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, ethnicity,
gender, or gender identity” (Hates crimes explained, 2018). There is a growing concern
with the data surrounding hate crimes, although there are proactive steps being taken it
does not solve all the current problems. Many crimes reported as a hate crime are
difficult to prove due to the lack of evidence. “For example, according to the California
Department of Justice, there were 1,066 hate incidents in 2018. Of the 425 that were
referred for prosecution, 314 were filed by district attorneys and elected city attorneys,
and 228 of those cases were filed as hate crimes. Of those that had dispositions
available for the California attorney general’s report, just 67 resulted in a conviction,
though others resulted in convictions for other crimes. Hate crimes are difficult to
prosecute in part because of the evidence needed to result in a conviction” (Hate
Crimes Explained, 2018).  Many cases may be convicted as different crimes due to the
insufficient evidence; many times, hate speech is needed to convince the court it is a
hate crime. Due to this problem data cannot be processed accurately, regardless of the
victim reporting the hate crime it may not be collected under hate crime statistics.

The second concern for inaccurate hate crime data derives from the victim’s
perspective. Many victims of such crimes do not report the crime, research shows that
about half of victims are not reporting the crime. This has been for many different
reasons, a frightening reality is that many people don’t trust law enforcement to help
them. “The second reason is arguably more impactful: If the community does not trust
law enforcement to help, individuals will not report the crime at all. In the Bureau of
Justice Statistics’ 2009-2017 National Crime Victimization Survey, about 44% of
respondents said they experienced a hate crime and did not report it for a number of
reasons, including believing the police would not help or would not be able to do
anything” (Hate Crimes Explained, 2018). With recent events this concern grows as
many communities do not feel they can rely on local police. Trust and dependability are
two foundations of law enforcers, however if citizens cannot have either than they fail to
help a large population. The Uniform Crime Report is completely voluntary to both
federal agencies and citizens, with little strategy and lack of importance to hate crime
reports there has been no increase in victim reports. Without a large population actively
reporting these crimes the UCR is missing a lot of important information to use and
study.

The third concern is regarding the inconsistency between states. In the United States
laws are different in each state, this means there is a lack of consistency in priority and
laws around hate crimes. In the 50 states there are 5 that do not have any laws for hate
crimes, and only 28 states that include gender bias. This has been hard to track as
every state lacks unity in their law enforcement. “The Home Office Data Hub
automatically collects and aggregates data from law enforcement agencies to
appropriately classify incidents and ensure they are addressed. In terms of
enforcement, in the United States, states must first create their own hate crime laws,
create the structures and training that will lead to their enforcement and the recording of
hate crimes or follow a number of steps to delegate responsibility to the Justice
Department. These states may elect to report hate crimes or not” (Hate Crimes
Explained, 2018). The graph attached at the bottom shows how states consider different
categories to be related to hate crimes and some that do not regard hate crimes in
general. This has been a problem for data, because if federal agencies do not consider
certain acts as hate crimes, they will not report it, thus failing to help the UCR report
accurately.

In conclusion although the need for hate crime data collection is high, the concerns
surrounding the inaccuracy continue to be alarming and justified. Without any strategy
to combat these concerns the hate crime statistics may never be completely accurate,
which may prevent law enforcement from knowledge surrounding hate crime
prevention. These three concerns need to be addressed and resolved before hate crime
data can evolve. FBI and law enforcement needs to have stronger guidelines around
validating a hate crime from other crimes. They must also be able to better understand
their community and be able to gain trust so victims can feel more empowered and
supported to report hate crimes. For the final concern which may be the most difficulty
there must be some consistency and unity between state laws around hate crimes to be
able to get more precise data and create a priority of rights for everyone.
 Hate Crime Laws by States
50
45
40
35
30
25
20
15
10
5
0
Race/Religion Sexual Orientation Disability Gender Gender Identity

Work Cited

Shanmugasundaram, S. (2018, April 15). Hate Crimes Explained. Southern Poverty Law Center.
https://www.splcenter.org/20180415/hate-crimes-explained.

ADL Hate Crime Map. ADL. (n.d.). https://www.adl.org/adl-hate-crime-map.

Investigation of Hate Crimes. (2016). IACP Law Enforcement Policy Center, 1–15.

Schwencke, K. (2017, December 4). Why America Fails at Gathering Hate Crime Statistics.
ProPUBLICA. https://www.propublica.org/article/why-america-fails-at-gathering-hate-
crime-statistics.