Hispanics are a hate crime victim category but not a perpetrator category. Hispanic offenders are classified as whites, which inflates the white offense rate and gives the impression that Hispanics commit no hate crimes.
A Mexican who is attacked because of ethnicity is recorded as Hispanic, but if the same Mexican attacks a black or white for racial reasons he is considered white. This inflates the figures for “white” hate crime perpetrators, and gives the impression that Hispanics commit no hate crimes.
Hate Crimes Committed by Hispanics
The government’s treatment of hate crimes is misleading in another, even more obvious way, in that the FBI reports hate crimes against Hispanics but not by Hispanics. Appendix B is the FBI’s “Hate Crime Incident Report,” which is used to record bias crimes. Although Hispanics are clearly indicated as a victim category in the “Bias Motivation” section, they are not a perpetrator category in “Suspected Race of Offender.” The FBI therefore forces local law enforcement agencies to categorize most Hispanic offenders as “white” (see “Measuring Hispanic Crime Rates,” below) and the figures for 1997 reflect this. The total number of hate crimes for that year–9,861–includes 636 crimes of anti-Hispanic bias, but not one of the 8,474 known offenders is “Hispanic” because the FBI’s data collection method does not permit such a designation.
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New Century Foundation