Hate Crime Statistics Research Articles

The Social Production of Hate Crime Statistics: The Differential Construction of Islamophobic Hate Crime by the Media and Law Enforcement

The decentralized nature of American policing largely allows agencies to define crime, and the requisite severity of that crime, at the institutional level. As a result, local hate crime statistics are differentially constructed across space. The current research posits that official hate crime statistics most accurately reflect a rate-producing, rather than a behavior-producing, process. Focusing on anti-Muslim hate crime, a particularly understudied form of hate crime, we examine reporting differences across community factors, using the media reports as a comparison point. We analyze official FBI hate crime reports, and news reports collected by Mapping Islamophobia, employing a logistic regression to predict anti-Muslim hate crime reporting. Our findings suggest significant variation in the social construction of anti-Muslim hate crime, both across institutions and across space.

Understanding community hate crimes as an incorrigible proposition: Local political attitudes, path dependence, and the ceremonious reporting of hate crime statistics

AbstractThe Hate Crime Statistics Act (HCSA) of 1990 requires the federal government to publicly release official hate crime statistics annually; the HCSA does not, however, mandate that local agencies submit hate crime reports to the government in the first place. Although research has evaluated the reporting of hate crime statistics in a dichotomous fashion (compliance vs. noncompliance), the current study suggests that the consistent and invariable reporting of zero hate crimes in a particular jurisdiction over time is unlikely and thus better conceptualized as a third response strategy: ceremonious compliance. We examine this strategy as a potentially unique institutional behavior, structured by local political and historical contexts, including discursive differences in the identification of hate crime as an important social problem, and localized histories of racial oppression. This research then uses multilevel multinomial logistic regression models to estimate variation in the likelihood of differential compliance strategies (i.e., true compliance, ceremonious compliance, noncompliance), according to several political and historical factors, including Republican vote share, location in the Confederate South, and historical lynchings. Findings reveal that political and historical contexts are important predictors of agency responses to hate crime, with a particular tendency toward ceremonious compliance in Republican‐leaning locales.

Hate Crime in Northern Ireland: The Need for Legislation and a Bespoke Version of the Prevent Strategy

ABSTRACT Following the rise in hate crime in Northern Ireland, in 2019 the Northern Ireland Assembly appointed Judge Marrinan to conduct a review into hate crime. Publishing his findings in his review in December 2020, this article examines the key recommendations that should be included in a Hate Crime Bill. As the Assembly is currently suspended, the article examines the hate crime statistics recorded following the publication of the review to illustrate why it is imperative that when it reconvenes, the Assembly introduce a Hate Crime Bill at the earliest opportunity. The article also argues that a prevention programme is introduced alongside the Bill to safeguard and prevent young people being drawn towards paramilitary activity along with hate crime and non-paramilitary terrorist activity. Young people are the focus of introducing an initial programme with the demographics in the hate crime statistics revealing a high number of offenders are that category. Following an examination of current programmes in place and the threat posed by paramilitaries and extremists, including the far right and extreme far right (neo-Nazis), the article recommends the current WRAP programme is developed to help and safeguard young people drawn to the paramilitaries to include hate crime and extremist related terrorism.

Variations in Hate Crime Cases by Bias Motivation Type: Findings From the National Hate Crime Investigation Study (NHCIS)

Accurate and detailed information on the nature of hate crimes in the United States has been hindered by limitations in the compiling of hate crime statistics. The National Hate Crime Investigation Study (NHCIS) collected data from a nationally representative sample of law enforcement agencies across the U.S. about the numbers of hate crimes investigated during 2018. Results show differences in a variety of case characteristics across four major categories of bias motivation (race/ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation/gender identity, and disability). Results suggest that police may miss hate crimes with bias motivations that are not clearly connected to common culturally recognized indicators. Training around non-stereotypical hate crime cases may help to identify and strengthen hate crime evidence.

Anti-Asian Violence and Abolition Feminism as Asian American Feminist Praxis

Abstract: Anti-Asian violence during the pandemic has been largely framed by mainstream media as an individual response to the pandemic and reduces anti-Asian violence to "hate" toward Asians, therefore justifying increased use of law enforcement and carceral punishment of individuals committing hate incidents. Additionally, some members of the Asian American community advocate for policy changes and collection of hate crimes statistics that rely more on carceral punishment. Other members of the Asian American community argue that hate crime statistics and legislation do not provide systemic changes necessary to address anti-Asian violence. Specifically, Asian American abolition feminists are challenging mainstream narratives that isolate violence to conversations of racism alone and calling for the abolition of the carceral system that is historically and inherently responsible for violence against Black, Indigenous, people of color (BIPOC) communities and women. This paper addresses carceral solutions to anti-Asian violence and the opportunities of abolition feminism as an Asian American feminist praxis to challenge violence against Asian Americans. Focusing on survivor-led movements and responses to violence in its multiple forms, I discuss how abolition feminism may be necessary for redressing anti-Asian violence. I also consider how Asian American abolition feminism can achieve truly liberating, transformative solutions and healing to violence through an abolitionist and decolonial feminist praxis that centers and engages with Indigenous Pacific Islander communities.

Historical Markers or Markers of White Supremacy? Confederate Memorialization, Racial Threat, and Hate Crime

Abstract Many Confederate monuments were erected during the Jim Crow era, sending symbolic messages of intimidation and hostility to the Black population. Yet no studies have examined the relationship between contemporary Confederate memorialization and bias crime. Drawing from research on hate crime law compliance, we posit an inverse relationship between Confederate monuments and mobilization of hate crime law, such that compliance with hate crime laws will be lower in communities with memorialization, but that among complying agencies, anti-Black hate crime rates will be higher. To examine these relationships, we combined data from the Uniform Crime Report Hate Crime Statistics and the American Community Survey with Confederate monument data from the Southern Poverty Law Center. We conducted analyses predicting a) monument presence, b) agency non-compliance, and c) anti-Black hate crime. Results indicate that monuments are located in communities exemplifying a challenge to racial hierarchies: economically advantaged communities with larger Black populations. Regarding hate crime, analyses show that (1) the American South is associated with reduced compliance, and, (2) after accounting for compliance, Confederate memorialization is associated with increased anti-Black hate crime. These findings have implications for intergroup conflict and the impact of local symbolism on the formal mobilization of hate crime law.

‘It’s easy to mistrust police when they keep on killing us’: A queer exploration of police violence and LGBTQ+ Victimization

ABSTRACT Almost 50 years after the Stonewall riots, queer liberation and police resistance are still inextricably intertwined. International hate crime statistics around the globe show increasingly high rates of LGBTQ+ victimization and criminalization by law enforcement. This qualitative research aims at evaluating whether queer theories of visibility and performativity could serve as useful tools to investigate the problematic dynamics between police and young queer individuals. For this purpose, online interviews were carried out with a sample of 20 young queer individuals from different European countries. Findings revealed that performing non-heteronormative bodies and behaviours is associated with being perceived as risky, dangerous and deviant. The correlation between queerness and deviance leads to a number of detrimental consequences, including police over-policing and criminalizing young LGBTQ+ individuals in public spaces, queer people underreporting hate crime incidents for fear of secondary victimization, and overall scepticism and mistrust towards the criminal justice system. Thus, this research not only affirms the importance of including queer voices in criminological research, but it also reveals the insidious nature of police violence against the LGBTQ+ community, which has long been neglected in queer studies.

Spatial prediction of sparse events using a discrete global grid system; a case study of hate crimes in the USA

ABSTRACT Spatial prediction of any geographic phenomenon can be an intractable problem. Predicting sparse and uncertain spatial events related to many influencing factors necessitates the integration of multiple data sources. We present an innovative approach that combines data in a Discrete Global Grid System (DGGS) and uses machine learning for analysis. A DGGS provides a structured input for multiple types of spatial data, consistent over multiple scales. This data framework facilitates the training of an Artificial Neural Network (ANN) to map and predict a phenomenon. Spatial lag regression models (SLRM) are used to evaluate and rank the outputs of the ANN. In our case study, we predict hate crimes in the USA. Hate crimes get attention from mass media and the scientific community, but data on such events is sparse. We trained the ANN with data ingested in the DGGS based on a 50% sample of hate crimes as identified by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC). Our spatial prediction is up to 78% accurate and verified at the state level against the independent FBI hate crime statistics with a fit of 80%. The derived risk maps are a guide to action for policy makers and law enforcement.

Trade Layoffs and Hate in the United States

ObjectiveRecent events (e.g., Brexit) have highlighted how globalization may foster hostility toward out‐groups in developed democracies. Is trade competition systematically related to hate in the United States?MethodsI conduct a county‐level statistical analysis using data from the Trade Adjustment Assistance program, the FBI's Hate Crime Statistics database, and the Southern Poverty Law Center's hate group map over the period of 2003–2017.ResultsCounties with more trade‐related layoffs tend to have more hate groups, though not hate crimes, even after accounting for changes in unemployment rates. The relationship between trade layoffs and hate groups is strongest in counties that have recently experienced larger decreases in the share of the white population.ConclusionsAlthough existing studies on diffuse economic vulnerability and hate find a weak connection between economic factors and hate, trade layoffs can explain some variation in local hate group activity.

Threat, emboldenment, or both? The effects of political power on violent hate crimes*

AbstractHow do expressions of support or opposition by the U.S. federal government, influence violent hate crimes against specific racial and ethnic minorities? In this article, we test two hypotheses derived from Blalock's (1967) conceptualization of intergroup power contests. The political threat hypothesis predicts that positive government attention toward specific groups would lead to more hateful violence directed against them. The emboldenment hypothesis predicts that negative government attention toward specific groups would also lead to more hateful violence directed against them. Using combined data on U.S. government actions and federal hate crime statistics from 1992 through 2012, vector autoregression models provide support for both hypotheses, depending on the protected group involved. We conclude that during this period, African Americans were more vulnerable to hate crimes motivated by political threat, and Latinx persons were more vulnerable to hate crimes motivated by emboldenment.

Apostasy, Human Rights and Hate Crime in England and Wales: A Mixed Methods Study

Apostasy, or leaving religion, is protected within international human rights law, however apostates face widespread abuses. In England and Wales, the right to change religion or belief is protected by the Human Rights Act. Evidence from campaigners suggests that this right is not enjoyed in practice, particularly by those leaving high control minority religious groups. Abuse and discrimination against apostates fall within the definition of religiously aggravated hate crime, however, apostasy is not included in government statistics or policy, and has not been addressed within academic research. The aim of this study is to understand the experiences of apostates in the context of human rights, and in regard to hate crime law and policy. A mixed methods approach was used, with quantitative data collected via an online victimisation survey, followed by semi-structured interviews with a number of respondents. The study was supported via social media by five NGOs that support apostates in order to access a diverse range of ex-religious groups. The study found that hate crime is a significant issue, particularly for apostates from high control religious backgrounds, and additionally many suffer abuses that would fall within definitions of domestic abuse and coercive control. These abuses have a significant impact on freedom of religion or belief and therefore represent a violation of article 9 ECHR. The study concludes that current legislation provides adequate protection for apostates, however this is not effective in practice due to a lack of recognition. The government in England and Wales have an obligation under human rights law to address the issues faced by apostates, and to include apostasy within hate crime statistics and policy action planning.

Points of departure: re-examining the discursive formation of the Hate Crime Statistics Act of 1990

ABSTRACTLeung’s article re-examines the political and legislative history of the debates that led up to the passage of the 1990 Hate Crime Statistics Act, in particular the 1980 House committee hearing on Increasing Violence against Minorities and a 1983 U.S. Commission on Civil Rights report entitled Intimidation and Violence: Racial and Religious Bigotry in America. Both identify organized white supremacy as the cause of the nation’s epidemic of racial intimidation and violent bigotry in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Many significant recommendations were made, but data collection became the first piece of legislation to address the national problem of hate violence. Leung seeks to explain why. By analysing the relationship between committee hearings, the key report and the political context of the Reagan administration, he demonstrates how ‘hate crime’ became an object of knowledge, and how its definition had implications for policy development.

FBI releases report on increased hate crimes

Hate crimes increased in 2015, according to a report released by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The report, 2015 Hate Crime Statistics, found a 6.8 percent increase in hate crimes in the United States in 2015. The 5,859 hate crime incidents reported in 2015 show an increase from 5,479 hate crimes reported in 2014. The demographic that faced the greatest increase in reported hate crimes was Muslims, who saw a 67 percent increase in reported hate crimes from 2014 to 2015. According to Mark Potok from the Southern Poverty Law Center, this is the highest number of hate crimes directed toward Muslims in America since 2001 with the al‐Qaida attacks on New York.

Adapting Minority Group Threat to Examine the Social Control of Sexual Orientation Bias.

Blalock proposed that the threat of a minority group toward a majority in sheer size, economic competition, or power will result in an increase in discrimination toward that group. His original formulation of this theory of minority group threat, and its subsequent extensions, has focused almost exclusively on racial minority-majority relationships; however, Blalock asserted that his theory would apply to any minority-majority group relationship. Extensions to religious groups have shown this is likely the case. The current analysis assesses a further extension of minority group threat by reframing the arguments of the theory and adding two additional sources of threat to examine sexual orientation bias. Data from the Uniform Crime Reports Hate Crime Statistics program are used to assess whether the minority group threat hypotheses explain the reporting of sexual orientation bias crimes. The findings indicate that the original formulation of Blalock's theory does not suffice to explain the reporting of anti-Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual bias crime, but the proposed extensions may explain some of this variation.

Assessing the “Statistical Accuracy” of the National Incident-Based Reporting System Hate Crime Data

The current study introduces a method to assess hate crime classification error in a state Incident-Based Reporting System. The study identifies and quantifies the “statistical accuracy” of aggregate hate crime data and provides insight from frontline officers about thought processes involved with classifying bias offenses. Random samples of records from two city and two county agencies provided data for the study. A systematic review of official case narratives determined hate crime classification error using state and federal definitions. A focus group sought to inquire about officers’ handling of hate crimes. Undercounting of hate crimes in official data was evident. When error rates were extrapolated, National Incident-Based Reporting System Group A hate crimes were undercounted by 67%. Officers’ responses validated complications involved with classifying hate crimes, particularly, incidents motivated “in part” by bias. Classification errors in reporting hate crimes have an impact on the statistical accuracy of official hate crime statistics. Officers’ offense descriptions provided greater awareness to issues with accurately interpreting and classifying hate crimes. The results yield useful information for officer training, understanding the true magnitude of these crimes, and a precursor for adjusting crime statistics to better estimate the “true” number of hate crimes in the population.

Police readiness for tackling hate crime against people with learning disabilities – areas for improvement and examples of good practice

PurposeThis paper aims to examine the extent to which police services are set up to deal with hate crime against people with learning disabilities; looking at infrastructure, policies, procedures and levels of awareness and understanding.Design/methodology/approachSemi‐structured interviews were conducted with representatives from 14 police services in England. Key documents submitted by the police services were reviewed, and a focus group with eight people with learning disabilities was conducted.FindingsMany police services are committed to tackling hate crime against people with learning disabilities. A wide variety of individuals have responsibility for dealing with hate crime and accountability structures are often unclear. Many services do not have hate crime policies that deal specifically with people with learning disabilities, or even disabled people in general. More training is required to ensure relevant staff are equipped to deal with the issues. Hate crime statistics are regarded as unreliable due to significant under‐reporting, although a few services have implemented innovative interventions to encourage reporting through awareness‐raising and multi‐agency working.Originality/valueThe Coalition Government has called for greater efforts at combating disability hate crime. It is widely acknowledged that the police are still failing disabled victims and witnesses. This paper identifies specific areas for improvement as well as innovative and effective practice that should be shared more widely.

Too Few Jews to Count? Police Monitoring of Hate Crime Against Jews in the United Kingdom

Despite its significance as a specific category of hate crime, anti-Jewish crime has received little attention in the scholarly literature on policing hate crime. Whereas hate crimes against Jews figure prominently in the annual hate crime statistics published by the Federal Bureau of Investigation in the United States, there are no routinely published police data on anti-Jewish incidents in the United Kingdom. Given the concerns about a rise in anti-Semitism in Britain in recent years, this article expands on written and oral testimony provided by the author to the All-Party Parliamentary Inquiry Into Anti-Semitism. It illuminates the inadequacies in the police monitoring of, and use of data on, anti-Jewish incidents and discusses the shortcomings in the context of the value of hate crime data for police services.

Bias-Crime Reporting

Over the past two decades, significant efforts have established categories of crimes motivated by bias and so enhanced the quality of information about the prevalence of such crimes in the United States. As part of a national reporting system established by the Hate Crime Statistics Act, local police agencies collect information about the prevalence and characteristics of bias-crime incidents. Although the quality of this program has improved since its inception, local police face several challenges to identifying and accurately classifying bias crimes, including the ambiguity of applying legal definitions to cases, uncertainty regarding bias motivation, and infrequency of reported events to law enforcement. Drawing on information from eight case studies, the article examines how local police identify and record bias crimes through various kinds of reporting procedures and organizational structures. The article concludes with best practice recommendations for bias-crime tracking and reporting of incidents of bias crime within local police agencies.

Islamophobia in America?: September 11 and Islamophobic Hate Crime1

ABSTRACT This article examines the sharp rise in hate crime directed at Muslims or those perceived to be Muslim following the September 11 attacks on the United States. The intense phase of these attacks comprised approximately nine weeks, after which the number of hate crimes fell sharply. The article attributes the abrupt fall in hate crime to four variables: 1) Leadership in the form of effective intervention by the U.S. President; 2) Decisive law enforcement intervention on the federal and local levels; 3) Grassroots outreach to Muslims by religious, civic and educational groups; and much more tentatively; 4) Moral ambiguity in the rapid dissolution of American consensus over the War on Terror following the invasion of Iraq. To illustrate these points, the paper compares the current situation to the treatment of Japanese Americans following Pearl Harbor and to the Red Scare of the 1950s. The impact of technology, especially the internet and the rise of al-Jazeera as alternative sources of information to the government or the major American media outlets, is examined as indirectly contributing to the rapid decline of hate crimes after the initial nine-week period. Finally, hate crime statistics from the FBI and the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee from the years 2000–2002 are examined to document the numbers and types of violent hate crimes directed at American Muslims and those perceived to be Muslim.

Learning to See Hate Crimes: A Framework for Understanding and Clarifying Ambiguities in Bias Crime Classification

Recent empirical research has identified ambiguity in bias crime reporting as a source of confusion and frustration in law enforcement agencies and as a source of error in the national hate crime statistics. The authors develop a framework for understanding and clarifying these ambiguities based on John Dewey’s conception of intension and extension and their own application of mathematical set theory to the issue. The authors discuss the implications of their model for helping law enforcement officials see bias crimes for varied purposes, including prevention, statistical reporting, and criminal prosecution.