FBI Civil Rights: Hate Crime, Research Paper Example

The fight against hate crime involves a significant number of variables.  One group that has taken some steps toward analyzing data and organizing agencies to fight hate crime is the Civil Rights Program of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).  This analysis will focus on the time of 2006 to 2007, in order to analyze the trends in a specific period of time.

Necessary Factors

The factors that gained the FBI’s involvement can be seen in a historical light.  Hate crimes were investigated by the FBI as early as the 1920s.  Prior to this the protection of civil rights was according to local jurisdiction and not the federal government.  In June of 1964, civil rights workers James Chanel, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner were murdered near Philadelphia, Mississippi, which launched a federal effort to protect the civil rights of African Americans.  MIBURN, standing for Mississippi burning, became the largest federal investigation ever to take place in Mississippi.  Later on October 20, 1967, seven men were convicted and were sentenced to prison.

The FBI is involved in cases that involve criminal violations of federal civil rights statutes, in relationship to hate crimes.  As hate crimes developed in the United States, the FBI sought to play a major role in such cases.  Additionally, the FBI serves as a backstop for state and local authorities in hate crime cases.  In relationship to the growing precedence of hate crimes, as seen in its historical light, the FBI’s involvement in hate crime cases was spawned through a more centralized federal agency, which also helps with data-related aspects (collected information since the 1990s [Ronczkowski, 2006, p. 22]) as well for hate crimes.

Nature of FBI’s Involvement in Hate Crimes

According to its definition, a hate crime involves bias or prejudice (Jacobs, 1998, p. 11).  While a hate crime is not a distinct federal offense, civil rights violations are under the jurisdiction of the federal government.  These violations are prosecuted as crimes of bias.

The jurisdiction of the FBI in such cases is however used as more of a backstop for state and local authorities.  State and local authorities handle the vast majority of cases of hate crime.  Hate crime offenses were increased in penalties, by way of a federal law in 1994, for those that could be proven to be hate crimes.  The FBI has one area in which it is the sole investigative force in relationship to hate crimes: it is the only force to investigate criminal violations of federal civil rights statutes.

Another major area of the FBI’s role in hate crimes may be found in its law enforcement support.  The FBI works closely with state and local agencies on investigations, regardless of whether federal charges are involved.  Experience in identification and proof of hate-based motivations, forensic expertise, and FBI resources are provided to law enforcement to complement investigative efforts.  The Department of Justice monitors proceedings so that the federal interest is vindicated and the law is equally applied among all of the 95 U.S. Judicial Districts.

The FBI also has other roles in relationship to hate crimes, other than the two preceding primary roles.  Completed reports are forwarded to U.S. Attorneys and the Civil Rights Division at the Department of Justice, in order to decide if federal prosecution.  If local authorities are unwilling or unable to move forward, they may move forward.  Additionally, the FBI may investigate hate crimes directed at the U.S. government or the American population, which are investigated as acts of domestic terrorism.

Supplementary Efforts

The FBI is involved with a number of groups, forces, and other supplementary efforts.  These are all in order to provide support for law enforcement, agencies, and other groups and organizations to target hate crimes.  They represent unique attempts to extend the FBI’s ability to assist such groups with hate crimes.

HCWGs

Established in 1998, the Attorney General’s Hate Crimes Working Groups (HCWG) are responsible for model hate crimes curriculum for state and local law enforcement officers.  Throughout the United States the FBI has played an active role in teaching this curriculum to law enforcement trainers.  Additionally, a majority of the FBI’s field offices participate in local Hate Crime Working Groups.

There are a substantial number of local Hate Crime Working Groups.  In addition to national and international involvement and focus, these groups are able to concentrate on the role of hate crimes within the local area.  They seek to strengthen the quality of hate crime programs and reduce hate crime victimization, in efforts to combat and find ways to curb the current state of hate crime.

National Church Arson Task Force

The National Church Arson Task Force was created in 1996 to respond to a number of arsons at African American churches, with which the FBI plays an active role.  Representatives of five federal agencies and the Executive Office of U.S. Attorneys make up the Task Force, where it works with local and state authorities to investigate church arsons.

The National Church Arson Task Force has seen a level of success since its inception in 1996.  It has excelled in the prosecution of individuals that have committed such arsons.  It also plays a chief role in helping victimized communities rebuild burned churches and prevent additional arsons.  It also heals tensions within communities, as well as other roles.

Public Outreach

At a national and local level the FBI is involved in civil rights organizations to share information, address concerns, establish rapport, and cooperate in solving problems.  The NAACP, the Anti-Defamation League, the National Asian Pacific American Legal Consortium, the Southern Poverty Law Center, and the National Organization for Women represent some of these organizations.  The FBI heads many attempts to join organizations such as these together in order to fight hate crimes.  This enables the FBI to become involved and provide assistance for organizations that target a special area within hate crimes, such as a particular race.

Training

Annual training sessions, operational seminars, and workshops for local law enforcement, community groups, and religious and minority organizations are conducted by the FBI in order to gain cooperation and address hate crimes.  The FBI also trains new agents, thousands of officers, and hundreds of current agents each year around the world.

Analysis

Overall the number of reported hate crimes was steady from 2006 to 2007.  The primary significant feature was the increase in reported violent attacks against those who are of Hispanic origin and lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) persons (Minteer, 2008).  Anti-Hispanic rates increased by 3.3% while those of a sexual orientation bias increased by 5.5% from 2006 to 2007.

In these two areas hate crimes have drastically risen over periods of time.  For instance, anti-Hispanic violence has risen by 35 percent from 2003 and 2006.  Compared to 2006, in 2007 there was a 24 percent increase in incidents of violence against LGBT people (Minteer, 2008).  In these two areas there are major increases in hate crimes for these two groups of people.

However, overall it seems as though hate crimes are maintaining its numbers.  In a couple of areas there has been a rise of hate crimes, as previously noted.  The reported statistics demonstrate that it is not reasonable to gauge whether the FBI’s efforts against hate crime has been successful or unsuccessful.

The current statistics do not allow for an accurate assessment, however.  Statistics provide a lack of insight into the difficult task of ascertaining the FBI’s effectiveness in relationship to its efforts in hate crimes.  The difficulties do not stop there, however, as there are a number of other variables which make effectiveness difficult to measure.

Thus it is important to disregard the notion that the FBI has been either successful or unsuccessful, in relationship to their efforts against hate crimes.  One explanation involves the overarching influence of the FBI and its various efforts, meaning that there simply too many variables to compare and contrast the FBI’s effectiveness.  Additionally, the role of statistics in hate crimes, as has been discussed and forthcoming in more detail, does not allow the effectiveness of the FBI’s efforts to properly be analyzed.  Thus assessments must not be made, but rather the FBI’s efforts should be viewed in their whole body of work, which is considerable.

Hindrances to Analyzing Effectiveness

Some of the most staggering statistics do not involve hate crimes.  At least not in itself, these stats involve the reporting of hate crimes.  Truly the reporting of such crimes is the main reason it is severely difficult to measure the effectiveness of the FBI.

The reporting of hate crimes results in vague statistics, which is devastating in the fight against hate crimes.  Nearly 15,500 out of 17,500 police jurisdictions took part in the reporting, or report zero hate crimes (Minteer, 2008).  This figure places a rather large cloud over data that is essential to analyzing figures in hate crimes.

The lack of reporting of hate crimes involves a loophole for those who do not wish to participate.  The US Attorney General collects the data from state and law enforcement agencies, which is required according to the Hate Crime Statistics Act (1990), although it is voluntary to submit this information (Shaw, 2002, p. 7).  The Department of Justice must take some action in order to provide accurate figures, which are extremely important in assessing the progress and status of hate crimes in the U.S.

There are further complications to the statistics of hate crimes in the United States.  As Human Rights First states, “Victim surveys and other data suggest that only a small portion of violent hate incidents are even reported to the police” (2008, p. 3).  The reality of victims reporting hate crimes is a major consideration to take into account, which thereby further complicates matters.  As some victims do not report crimes for a number of different reasons, it is difficult to get accurate analysis based on incomplete facts.

Outlook

The overall outlook for the continued efforts against hate crime for the FBI is difficult to measure.  There are clear factors which will play pivotal roles in whether future endeavors in battling hate crime will be successful.  The FBI must be able to read and react to these important considerations.

One technological obstruction is seen with the Internet.  It has been documented to pose a number of additional problems to the topic of hate crimes.  This is especially true in reference to extremist groups spreading their message.  Also, the Internet is rather anonymous and difficult to prosecute (Shaw, 2002, p. 5).

The problems related to the technological advance of the Internet will continue to complicate the situation involving hate crimes.  The FBI must be able to react accordingly to different trends and topics relating to the Internet, in order to respond to these topics.  For instance, social networking is probably represents the current technological trend.  Identifying these and how they may contribute to factors of hate crimes is essential.  The FBI should continue to implement a number of actions to gather intelligence and counteract such factors to battle hate crime more efficiently.

The largest impediment to battling hate crime more effectively involves the topic of statistics.  With reference to the earlier discussion, the vast majority of departments do not report hate crime statistics, as this is not mandatory.  These factors result in the unreliability of statistics in hate crimes.  While the low documented reporting of hate crimes for victims complicates the subject of statistics in its own right, these resulting effects due to the lack of reporting is not beneficial to the situation.

The United States must therefore take active steps to combat the lack of statistics for hate crimes.  This recommendation is not new, however: “The Department of Justice should take steps to increase hate crime reporting by local jurisdictions, targeting agencies that have not participated, have underreported, or have reported zero hate crimes in the past” (Minteer, 2008).  The federal government must take some active steps toward obtaining reasonably accurate hate crime statistics.

The FBI, if they take according steps, should be able to find success in the ongoing battle of hate crimes.  It is difficult to label such a large effort as being “successful” or “unsuccessful,” as there are many segregations and numbers to consider.  There are many efforts to consider.

However the FBI will be successful if they are able to react accordingly to pivotal areas that are related to hate crimes.  Anti-Hispanic violence, sexual orientation bias crimes, matters involving technologies and the Internet, and the nature of hate crime statistics are areas in which the FBI and federal government can concentrate on improvement.  Success in years to follow will be gauged on these current, particular issues, in addition to others.

England and Wales – Hate Crime

The statistics and methods used to battle hate crime in England and Wales is particularly revealing.  Police forces have recorded racial attacks and harassment since 1986.  Additionally, the Crime and Disorder Act (1998) created a total of nine new offences of racial aggravation.  It allows the courts to increase the severity of the sentence by up to two years, according to the International Centre for the Prevention of Crime (Shaw, 2002, p. 9).

The British Crime Survey (BCS) provides victim reports of racially motivated incidents.  This is another means of obtaining information, other than the police’s recording of racial incidents.  The BCS reveals the police’s underestimation of victimization and reveals that victims are more likely to be an ethnic minority than whites (Shaw, 2002, p. 9).

The statistics obtained has allowed England and Wales to keep track of figures conveniently.  Representing a number of options, such as police recordings and the BCS, England and Wales are able to take advantage of different forms of reports to ascertain the status of hate crimes.  These lessons could help the United States in designing other means to get a better reading on hate crime statistics.

References

Human Rights First.  (2008). 2008 Hate Crime Survey. New York, NY: Human Rights First.

Jacobs, J and Potter, K. (1998). Hate Crimes: Criminal Law & Identity Politics. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

Minteer, K.  (2008). New FBI Hate Crime Statistics Confirm Need for Stronger Federal Response. Retrieved from http://www.humanrightsfirst.org/media/disc/2008/alert/354/index.htm

Ronczkowski, M. (2006). Terrorism and Organized Hate Crime: Intelligence Gathering, Analysis and Investigations (2^nd ed.). Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press.

Shaw M and Barchechat O.  (2002). Preventing Hate Crimes: International Strategies and Practice. International Centre for the Prevention of Crime.  Retrieved from http://www.crime-prevention-intl.org/publications/pub_3_1.pdf