What does this indicator measure?
This indicator reports the number of bias-motivated offenses that are reported to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) by the police departments of cities within the Dallas Primary Metropolitan Statistical Area (PMSA). Texas' hate crime statute is a penalty enhancement law that allows any offense to be reclassified and prosecuted as a hate crime if, according to Article 42.014 of the Texas Statutes Code of Criminal Procedure, it can be demonstrated in a court that the victim was selected "because of the defendant’s bias or prejudice against a person or group." In 2001, the passage of the James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Act further clarified the definition of a hate crime in Texas as one that has been proven in court to have been motivated by "the race, religion, color, disability, sexual orientation, national origin, or ancestry" of the victim. Bias-motivated offenses are formally classified by the FBI by the following categories:
- Race
- Religion
- Sexual Orientation
- Ethnicity or national origin
- Disability
The reporting of hate crime data occurs at the law enforcement level, and no inference can be made about the eventual prosecutorial outcome of the judicial process involving these offenses. It is assumed here that the offenses reported to the FBI as hate crimes meet the legal criteria for prosecution and sentencing as hate or bias crimes. Data presented here denote offenses that have been deemed by a law enforcement agency to contain sufficient evidence to lead a reasonable and prudent person to conclude that the offender’s actions were motivated by his or her bias. These data do not reflect offenses for which, upon a further review of the facts surrounding the case, the prosecuting attorney decides to apply the hate crime statute.
Moreover, it is also noted that only reportable offenses are reported to the FBI, and therefore only reportable offenses are included in this data. Reportable hate crime categories and their offenses include the following:
- crimes against persons (murder and non-negligent manslaughter, forcible rape, aggravated assault, simple assault, and intimidation)
- crimes against property (robbery, burglary, larceny-theft, motor vehicle theft, arson, and destruction/damage/vandalism)
- crimes against society (46 other offenses including, but not limited to, drug or narcotic offenses, gambling offenses, prostitution offenses, and weapon law violations)
Why is this indicator important?
It is extremely difficult to objectively quantify the extent of bias or hatred against any particular group within a community. However, if at all present, such hatred can quickly become a significantly important community problem when it is used as a justification for criminal activities, particularly violent activities, committed against other community members. While the effects of such criminal activity on the victims are obvious, perhaps most significant are the corollary effects of hate crime events on a community. Lack of trust, underlying racial tension, intolerance, and fear all become heightened when hate crimes are present in a community.
This indicator is important because the extent and degree of bias as a motivation for criminal offenses within a community can erode the sense of accepted tolerance for diversity within that community, as well as its racial, ethnic, and religious cohesiveness. The presence of hate crimes within a community strikes at the very core of what an ideal community should be. Verifiable knowledge about the extent and nature of hate crimes or bias-motivated offenses within a community help reveal the genuine atmosphere of a community.
How are we doing?
As with other crime data, local hate crime data are best understood within the larger context. In this case, state hate crime data show that since a peak of 540 reported offenses in 2001, the number of hate crimes reported has steadily declined. While hate crime data for 2003 (324 reported offenses) denote the lowest level of hate crime offenses since 2000, hate crime data for 2004 show a reversal in the previous downward trend, with 376 offenses reported in Texas during 2004.
A closer inspection of state level data reveals that among the five types of bias-motivated offenses reported, race- and ethnicity-motivated hate crimes consistently account for most of the hate crime offenses in Texas. For example, among the five categories of bias motivation reported, racially-motivated hate crimes and ethnically-motivated hate crimes accounted for most of the bias-motivated offenses committed in Texas between 2000 and 2003. Hate crime offense data for 2004 report a different scenario from that of previous years: In 2004, sexual orientation surpassed ethnicity (but not race) as one of the two top motivations for hate crime offenses in Texas.
Hate crime data for cities within the Dallas PMSA show the peak for bias-motivated offenses in 2004, with 105 offenses reported. An analysis of local hate crime data as a proportion of the state annual total reveals that, with the exception of offenses motivated by religious differences, cities of the Dallas PMSA have shown an increase in their share of offenses motivated by race, sexual orientation, and ethnicity. Moreover, since 2000, cities within the Dallas PMSA have increasingly accounted for an even greater share of offenses motivated by these particular biases. For example, in 2004, cities in the Dallas PMSA accounted for 35.0% of all hate crime offenses motivated by race and 42.0% of all offenses motivated by sexual orientation.