Over the past 20 years, JBHE has compiled a database on hate crime incidents on college campuses. We have found that over the course of the past two decades, the number of incidents has remained stable.
A new report from the Bureau of Justice Statistics finds that on average, 250,000 Americans over the age of 12 are victimized by hate crime each year in the United States. And the statistics have remained virtually constant over recent years.
The number of hate crimes in the United States as reported in the new study by the Bureau of Justice Statistics is 25 to 40 times higher than the number of hate crime reported in an annual summary published by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The FBI hate crime database asks local law enforcement agencies to voluntarily report incidents to the FBI. In 2011, in Louisiana, a state with a large Black population, law enforcement reported only five hate crime incidents to the FBI. Massachusetts, where Blacks are a small percentage of the population, reported 367 incidents. It is true that many hate crimes involve sexual orientation, religious affiliation, or other ethnic groups but Blacks are the victims in a large percentage of all hate crimes. The new report finds that race is the motivating factor in 54 percent of all hate crimes.
The report, Hate Crime Victimization, 2003-2011, may be downloaded here.
HARDLY COLLEGIAL, THESE OCCURRENCES!