Children and Hate Crimes

A Special Report from the Bureau of Justice Statistics on Hate Crimes, otherwise known as Bias Crimes, (published 2001) highlighted some surprising information regarding the nature of hate crimes in the U.S. This report was in direct response to the Hate Crimes Statistics Act of 1990, which required the establishment of a system for tracking and reporting of information regarding the nature and prevalence of hate crimes.

Highlights of the report are as follows:

• Younger offenders were responsible for most hate crimes. 31% of violent offenders and 46% of property offenders were [u]under[/u] the age of 17. 60% of violent offenders and 71% of property offenders were under the age of 24.
• More than 50% of victims of violence were age 24 or under, 33% were under 18, and 8% were 12 or under
• Intimidation, simple assault, and aggravated assault were the most commonly reported violent hate crime offenses, accounting for nearly 6 out of 10 bias incidents
• 61% of hate crime incidents were motivated by race, 14% by religion, 13% by sexual orientation, 11% by ethnicity, and 1% by victim disability
• Six in 10 racially biased incidents targeted Blacks, and 3 in 10 targeted Whites.

Early intervention, and teaching children to respect and appreciate differences can go a long way towards preventing these types of crimes:

• A Queens Supreme Court Judge sentences teenage killer Charles Bryant to prison for 51 years for beating and stabbing 18 year old Huang Chen - a Chinese food delivery man - to death
• A 19-year old is charged with a hate crime after firing a BB gun and striking two Asian members of a high school track team running through the city
• Several 13 and 14 year olds spray paint swastikas on Jewish homes in Clifton New Jersey
• A youth tells a policeman he shot a gay man to death because he hates homosexuals