Yep. All violent crimes are crimes of hate. It's a slippery slope when we begin to adjudicate someone's emotions and not their actions. There are plenty of crimes that these punks could have been charged with besides some type of "hate" enhancer - menacing, incitement etc. etc.
Having said that, justice was not served here. No one has the right to murder - and this was murder. I'm afraid that there may have been some kind of jury nullification in this case. Some of these states have such strange laws. I'm not sure how a death can result from a "simple assault" and the person not be found guilty of at least manslaughter. Very odd.
Some purported confusion about who delivered the fatal kick.
Unfortunately, I think the reason they were acquitted of murder might have something to do with the fact that the victim is partially culpable for his demise because he responded to provocation instead of walking away. If the teens had just jumped on him and started whaling on him, the outcome of the trial might have been different...