U.S. Department of Justice Office of Justice Programs Bureau of Justice Statistics ------------------------------------------------------ This file is text only without graphics and many of the tables. A Zip archive of the tables in this report in spreadsheet format (.csv) and the full report including tables and graphics in .pdf format are available on BJS's website at: https://www.bjs.gov/index.cfm?ty=pbdetail&iid=5967 ------------------------------------------------------ ****************** Special Report ****************** ************************************************ Hate Crime Victimization, 2004-2015 ************************************************ Madeline Masucci, BJS Intern Lynn Langton, Ph.D., BJS Statistician ************************************************* In 2015, the rate of violent hate crime victimization was 0.7 hate crimes per 1,000 persons age 12 or older (figure 1). This rate was not significantly different from the rate in 2004 (0.9 per 1,000).*** Footnote 1 Unless otherwise noted, the comparisons in this report are significant at the 95% confidence level.*** The absence of statistically significant change in rates from 2004 to 2015 generally held true for violent hate crimes both reported and unreported to police. However, between 2012 and 2015, the rate of unreported violent hate crime declined slightly, from 0.6 to 0.3 victimizations per 1,000 persons 12 or older (90% confidence level). Findings are primarily from the Bureau of Justice Statistics’ (BJS) National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS), which has collected data on crimes motivated by hate since 2003. The NCVS and the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Hate Crime Statistics Program are the principal sources of annual information on hate crime in the United States. BJS and the FBI use the hate crime definition established by the Hate Crime Statistics Act (28 U.S.C. § 534): “crimes that manifest evidence of prejudice based on race, gender or gender identity, religion, disability, sexual orientation, or ethnicity.” The NCVS measures crimes perceived by victims to be motivated by an offender’s bias against them for belonging to or being associated with a group largely identified by these characteristics. ***************************************************** ************* HIGHLIGHTS ************* * U.S. residents experienced an average of 250,000 hate crime victimizations each year from 2004 to 2015. * There was no statistically significant change in the annual rate of violent hate crime victimization from 2004 to 2015 (0.7 per 1,000 persons age 12 or older). * The majority (99%) of victims cited offenders’ use of hate language as evidence of a hate crime. * During the 5-year aggregate period from 2011-15, racial bias was the most common motivation for hate crime (48%). * About 54% of hate crime victimizations were not reported to police during 2011-15. * During 2011-15, Hispanics (1.3 per 1,000) experienced higher rate of violent hate crime victimization than non-Hispanic whites (0.7 per 1,000) and blacks (1.0 per 1,000). ***************************************************** Hate crime victimization refers to a single victim or household that experienced a criminal incident believed to be motivated by hate. For violent crimes (rape or sexual assault, robbery, aggravated assault, and simple assault) and for personal larceny, the count of hate crime victimizations is the number of individuals who experienced a violent hate crime. For crimes against households (burglary, motor vehicle theft, or other theft), each household affected by a hate crime is counted as a single victimization. This report presents NCVS data on the characteristics of hate crime and its victims from 2004 to 2015. Trend estimates are based on 2-year rolling averages centered on the most recent year. For example, estimates reported for 2015 represent the average estimates for 2014 and 2015. This approach increases the reliability and stability of estimates, which facilitates comparing estimates over time. The report also presents comparisons between the NCVS and the UCR program in terms of overall trends in hate crime victimization and the type of bias that motivated the crime. *************************************** No significant change was observed in the number of violent or property hate crimes from 2004 to 2015 *************************************** On average, U.S. residents experienced approximately 250,000 hate crime victimizations each year between 2004 and 2015, of which about 230,000 were violent hate victimizations (not shown). The number of total and violent hate crime victimizations did not change significantly from 2004 to 2015 (table 1). During this period, property hate crime victimizations were also flat following a decline from 2004 to 2005. In 2015, hate crime victimizations accounted for 1% of the total victimizations captured by the NCVS. Violent hate crime victimizations accounted for 4% of all violent victimizations. *************************************** Racial bias was the most common motivation for hate crime during 2011–15 *************************************** The NCVS asked hate crime victims about the types of bias they suspected motivated the crime. During the aggregated 5-year period from 2011 to 2015, victims suspected that nearly half (48%) of hate crime victimizations were motivated by racial bias (figure 2). About a third of victims believed they were targeted because of their ethnicity (35%) or their gender (29%). About 1 in 5 believed the hate crime was motivated by bias against persons or groups with which they were associated (23%) or by sexual orientation (22%). About 1 in 6 hate crime victimizations were thought to be motivated by bias against the victim’s religion (17%) or disability (16%). Between 2007 and 2015, the percentage of hate crimes perceived by victims to be motivated by racial bias decreased from 62% to 48% (figure 3). During that time, the percentage of hate crimes suspected to be motivated by gender bias nearly doubled from 15% in 2007 to 29% in 2015. In 2009, the federal hate crime legislation was amended to include gender and gender identity as protected categories. *************************************** The majority of victims cited offenders’ use of hate language as evidence of a hate crime *************************************** For a crime to be classified as a hate crime in the NCVS, the victim must report at least one of three types of evidence that the act was motivated by hate: * the offender used hate language * the offender left behind hate symbols * police investigators confirmed that the incident was hate crime. During 2011-15, almost all hate crime victims (99%) cited the offenders’ use of hate language as evidence that the crime was motivated by hate (table 2). Fewer than 1 in 10 hate crime victims reported that the offender left hate symbols at the scene (5%) or that the victimization was confirmed to be a hate crime by police investigators (7%). (See Methodology.) *************************************** During 2011-15, nearly two-thirds (62%) of hate crimes were simple assaults *************************************** Overall, about 90% of NCVS-reported hate crimes involved violence, and about 29% were serious violent crimes (rape or sexual assault, robbery, and aggravated assault) (table 3). *** Footnote 2 For offense definitions see Criminal Victimization, 2015 (NCJ 250180, BJS web, October 2016, p15), and Terms and Definitions: Victims (BJS web).*** During 2011-15, violent crime accounted for a higher percentage of hate (90%) than nonhate (25%) crime victimizations. The majority of hate crimes were simple assaults (62%), followed by aggravated assault (18%), robbery (8%), and theft (7%). Except for rape or sexual assaults, the distribution of types of violent crimes was fairly similar across hate and nonhate victimizations during 2011-15 (figure 4). Rape or sexual assault accounted for a lower percentage of violent hate (3%) than nonhate (6%) crime victimizations. *************************************** 1 in 4 violent hate crimes involved a weapon during 2006-15 *************************************** During 2006-15, no statistically significant difference was observed in the percentage of violent hate (24%) and nonhate (21%) victimizations involving a weapon (table 4). However, a lower percentage of violent victimizations involved a firearm in hate (5%) than nonhate (7%) crime victimizations. The majority (78%) of violent hate crime victims did not suffer from any injuries during the event. A lower percentage of violent hate (22%) victimizations than violent nonhate (26%) victimizations involved an injury (90% confidence level). *************************************** Hate crime victimizations were more likely to occur outside of the home than nonhate crime victimizations *************************************** During 2011-15, the largest portion of hate victimizations occurred at or near the victim’s home (39%) (table 5). However, hate crime victimizations were less likely to occur at or near the victim’s home than nonhate crime victimizations (61%). A greater percentage of hate victimizations than nonhate victimizations occurred in commercial places, parking lots, on public transportation, and at school. ************************************************************* Violent hate crimes were less likely to result in arrest than violent nonhate crimes ************************************************************* During 2011-15, less than half of total and violent (42% each) hate crime victimizations were reported to police (table 6). There was no significant difference in the percentage of violent hate (42%) and violent nonhate (46%) crimes reported to police. For total crime, a higher percentage of complaints were signed in reported hate (31%) than in nonhate (22%) crime victimizations (90% confidence level). This was not true for violent crime. Violent nonhate (28%) crimes reported to police were nearly three times more likely to result in an arrest than violent hate (10%) crimes. About 4% of all violent hate crimes, whether reported or not, resulted in an arrest (not shown). *************************************** About 2 in 5 hate crime victimizations not reported to police were handled another way *************************************** Approximately 54% of hate crime victimizations were not reported to police during 2011-15. The most common reason for not reporting to police was that the victimization was handled another way (41%), such as privately or through a non-law enforcement official (e.g., apartment manager or school official) (table 7). About a quarter (23%) of hate crime victims who did not report the crime believed that police would not want to be bothered or to get involved, would be inefficient or ineffective, or would cause trouble for the victim. About 1 in 5 (19%) crime victims stated that the victimization was not important enough to report to police. With the exception of reasons that fell in the “other” category, no significant difference was observed in the most important reasons for not reporting hate and nonhate violent crime victimizations to police. *************************************** Hispanics experienced a higher rate of violent hate crime victimization than non-Hispanic whites *************************************** During 2011-15, males (0.9 per 1,000 persons age 12 or older) and females (0.8 per 1,000) had similar rates of hate crime victimization (table 8). Hispanics (1.3 per 1,000) experienced a higher rate of violent hate victimization than non-Hispanic whites (0.7 per 1,000). However, more than half (53%) of hate crime victimizations were against whites. Whites accounted for a lower percentage of victims of hate crimes than nonhate (64%) victimizations. A higher percentage of violent crime victims were Hispanic in hate (25%) than nonhate (14%) victimizations. For both hate (90% confidence level) and nonhate violent crime victimizations, young persons ages 12 to 17 had a higher rate of victimization than persons age 50 or older. In both hate and nonhate violent victimizations, persons in households in the lowest income bracket had the highest rate of victimization than all other income categories. *************************************** The largest percentage of violent hate crimes occurred in the West *************************************** The percentage (46%) and rate (1.6 per 1,000) of violent hate victimization occurring in the West was greater than that of any other region (table 9). The South accounted for a lower percentage of hate (19%) than nonhate (32%) crime victimizations. During 2011-15, more than 90% of violent hate crime victimizations were against persons living in urban (47%) and suburban (46%) areas. A lower percentage of violent hate crime (7%) than nonhate crime (13%) involved persons in rural areas. For both hate (1.2 per 1,000) and nonhate (24.9 per 1,000) crimes, the rates of victimization were highest in urban areas. *************************************** Nearly half (46%) of violent hate crime victimizations were committed by a stranger *************************************** The NCVS asks victims of violent crime about the characteristics of the offender. In both hate (63%) and nonhate (78%) violent crime victimizations, the majority of offenders acted alone during 2011-15 (table 10). However, a higher percentage of violent hate crimes (30%) involved multiple offenders than violent nonhate crimes (17%). Across violent hate and nonhate crimes, a greater percentage of offenders were male than female. Males were less likely to be offenders in violent hate crimes (61%) than violent nonhate crimes (69%) (90% confidence level). A lower percentage of violent victimizations were committed by white offenders in violent hate (38%) than violent nonhate (54%) crimes. Whites and blacks accounted for a similar proportion of violent hate crime offenders. During 2011-15, persons age 30 or older accounted for the largest percentage of offenders in both violent hate (43%) and violent nonhate (37%) crimes. A lower percentage of offenders were ages 18 to 29 in violent hate crime (17%), compared to violent nonhate crime (28%). Nearly half (46%) of violent hate crime victimizations were committed by a stranger. In comparison, the majority (55%) of violent nonhate victimizations were committed by someone at least casually known to the victim. A lower percentage of offenders were known to the victim in hate (44%) than nonhate (55%) violent crime. *************************************** Differences in hate crime counts collected by the NCVS and UCR program can largely be attributed to victims’ reporting and police classification *************************************** In addition to the NCVS data on hate crime victimization, the other main measure of hate crime in the United States is the FBI’s Hate Crime Statistics Program, part of the Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) program. The NCVS and UCR were designed to be complementary but different.*** Footnote 3 For more information on the differences between the NCVS and UCR program, see The Nation’s Two Crime Measures (NCJ 246832, BJS web, September 2014).*** The FBI’s Hate Crime Statistics Program includes only reported crimes that police determined to be and recorded as hate crimes. Alternatively, the NCVS is based on victims’ perceptions that a crime was motivated by bias because the offender used hate language, left hate symbols, or police confirmed that it was a hate crime. The NCVS includes hate crimes that were both reported and not reported to police. Due to the differences in the scope of the two collections, the overall annual counts of hate crime in the United States are significantly higher based on NCVS data than the UCR program. Based on data from the NCVS during 2003-15, persons age 12 or older experienced an annual average of 252,630 hate crime victimizations, of which about 41% (104,600) were reported to police (figure 5). Of those 104,600, about 14% (14,380) were confirmed by police investigators as hate crimes. The remaining 86% of those reported to police were classified as hate crimes in the NCVS because the offender used hate language or left hate symbols at the crime scene. The NCVS annual estimate of 14,380 hate crimes confirmed by police investigators as hate crimes was not statistically different from the UCR annual average number of hate crime victims (8,370) during the same period. *************************************** Violent crimes made up 87% of NCVS hate crimes reported to police, but 60% of hate crimes recorded in the UCR program *************************************** Another major difference between the two collections is that the NCVS focuses on hate crimes experienced by individuals, while the UCR program also captures hate crimes committed against businesses, religious institutions, other organizations, and society as a whole. The two surveys also measure somewhat different types of crimes. For instance, the UCR program measures homicide and vandalism, while the NCVS does not. Due to the differences between the two collections, from 2003-15, 87% of NCVS hate crimes reported to police were violent crimes, while 60% of UCR program recorded hate crimes were violent (table 11). Serious violent crime accounted for 31% of NCVS hate crime reported to police, compared to about 13% of UCR hate crime. Vandalism and intimidation, two crimes not measured in the NCVS, accounted for about 60% of UCR hate crime. During 2003-15, the UCR program also reveals that 100 persons were victims of hate crime homicide (murder or nonnegligent manslaughter) (not shown). This was an average of eight hate crime homicides per year in the United States during this 12-year period. However, in 2015 there were 18 recorded hate crime homicides. **************** Methodology **************** Survey coverage **************** The National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) is an annual data collection conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau for the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS). The NCVS is a self-report survey in which interviewed persons are asked about the number and characteristics of victimizations experienced during the prior 6 months. The NCVS collects information on nonfatal personal crimes (rape or sexual assault, robbery, aggravated and simple assault, and personal larceny) and household property crimes (burglary, motor vehicle theft, and other theft) both reported and not reported to police. In addition to providing annual level and change estimates on criminal victimization, the NCVS is the primary source of information on the nature of criminal victimization incidents. Survey respondents provide information about themselves (e.g., sex, race, Hispanic origin, age, marital status, education level, and income) and whether they experienced a victimization. For each victimization incident, the NCVS also collects information about the offender (e.g., sex, race, Hispanic origin, age, and victim-offender relationship), characteristics of the crime (including time and place of occurrence, use of weapons, nature of injury, and economic consequences), whether the crime was reported to police, reasons the crime was or was not reported, and victim experiences with the criminal justice system. The NCVS is administered to persons age 12 or older from a nationally representative sample of households in the United States. The NCVS defines a household as a group of persons who all reside at a sampled address. Persons are considered household members when the sampled address is their usual place of residence at the time of the interview and when they have no usual place of residence elsewhere. Once selected, households remain in the sample for 3 years, and eligible persons in these households are interviewed every 6 months either in person or over the phone for a total of seven interviews. All first interviews are conducted in person with subsequent interviews conducted either in person or by phone. New households rotate into the sample on an ongoing basis to replace outgoing households that have been in the sample for the 3-year period. The sample includes persons living in group quarters, such as dormitories, rooming houses, and religious group dwellings, and excludes persons living in military barracks and institutional settings such as correctional facilities or hospitals, and persons who are homeless. Nonresponse and weighting adjustments *************************************** In 2015, 95,760 households and 163,880 persons age 12 or older were interviewed for the NCVS. Each household was interviewed twice during the year. The response rate was 82% for households and 86% for eligible persons. Victimizations that occurred outside of the United States were excluded from this report. In 2015, less than 1% of the unweighted victimizations occurred outside of the United States and were excluded from the analyses. Estimates in this report use NCVS data files from 2003 through 2015, weighted to produce annual estimates of victimization for persons age 12 or older living in U.S. households. Because the NCVS relies on a sample rather than a census of the entire U.S. population, weights are designed to inflate sample point estimates to known population totals and to compensate for survey nonresponse and other aspects of the sample design. The NCVS data files include both person and household weights. Person weights provide an estimate of the population represented by each person in the sample. Household weights provide an estimate of the U.S. household population represented by each household in the sample. After proper adjustment, both household and person weights are also typically used to form the denominator in calculations of crime rates. Victimization weights used in this analysis account for the number of persons present during an incident and for high- frequency repeat victimizations (i.e., series victimizations). Series victimizations are similar in type but occur with such frequency that a victim is unable to recall each individual event or describe each event in detail. Survey procedures allow NCVS interviewers to identify and classify these similar victimizations as series victimizations and to collect detailed information on only the most recent incident in the series. The weight counts series incidents as the actual number of incidents reported by the victim, up to a maximum of 10 incidents. Including series victimizations in national rates results in large increases in the level of violent victimization. However, trends in violent crime are generally similar, regardless of whether series victimizations are included. In 2015, series incidents accounted for about 1% of all victimizations and 4% of all violent victimizations. Weighting series incidents as the number of incidents up to a maximum of 10 incidents produces more reliable estimates of crime levels, while the cap at 10 minimizes the effect of extreme outliers on rates. Additional information on the series enumeration is detailed in the report Methods for Counting High-Frequency Repeat Victimizations in the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCJ 237308, BJS web, April 2012). Standard error computations ***************************** When national estimates are derived from a sample, as with the NCVS, caution must be used when comparing one estimate to another estimate or when comparing estimates over time. Although one estimate may be larger than another, estimates based on a sample have some degree of sampling error. The sampling error of an estimate depends on several factors, including the amount of variation in the responses and the size of the sample. When the sampling error around an estimate is taken into account, the estimates that appear different may not be statistically different. One measure of the sampling error associated with an estimate is the standard error. The standard errors vary from one estimate to the next. Generally, an estimate with a small standard error provides a more reliable approximation of the true value than an estimate with a large standard error. Estimates with relatively large standard errors are associated with less precision and reliability and should be interpreted with caution. To generate standard errors around numbers and estimates from the NCVS, the Census Bureau produced generalized variance function (GVF) parameters for BJS. The GVFs take into account aspects of the NCVS complex sample design and represent the curve fitted to a selection of individual standard errors based on the Jackknife Repeated Replication technique. The GVF parameters were used to generate standard errors for each point estimate (e.g., counts, percentages, and rates) in this report. BJS conducted tests to determine whether differences in estimated numbers, percentages, and rates in this report were statistically significant once sampling error was taken into account. Using statistical programs developed specifically for the NCVS, all comparisons in the text were tested for significance. The primary test procedure was the Student’s t-statistic, which tests the difference between two sample estimates. Differences described as greater, larger than, or higher passed a test at the 0.05 level of statistical significance (95% confidence level). Findings that passed a test at the 0.10 level of significance are noted in the text (90% confidence level). Caution is required when comparing estimates not explicitly discussed in this report. Data users can use the estimates and the standard errors of the estimates provided in this report to generate a confidence interval around the estimate as a measure of the margin of error. The following example illustrates how standard errors can be used to generate confidence intervals: According to the NCVS, in 2015, the violent hate crime victimization rate among persons age 12 or older was 0.7 per 1,000 persons (see table 1). Using the GVFs, it was determined that the estimated victimization rate has a standard error of 0.15 (see appendix table 2). A confidence interval around the estimate was generated by multiplying the standard errors by ±1.96 (the t-score of a normal, two-tailed distribution that excludes 2.5% at either end of the distribution). Therefore, the 95% confidence interval around the 0.7 estimate from 2015 is 0.7 ± (0.15 × 1.96) or (0.4 to 1.0). In others words, if different samples using the same procedures were taken from the U.S. population in 2015, 95% of the time the violent victimization rate would fall between 0.4 and 1.0 per 1,000 persons. BJS also calculated a coefficient of variation (CV) for all estimates, representing the ratio of the standard error to the estimate. CVs provide a measure of reliability and a means for comparing the precision of estimates across measures with differing levels or metrics. Evidence that hate crimes occurred *********************************** For NCVS crimes to be classified as hate crimes, the victim had to report one of three types of evidence that the offender was motivated by bias: (1) the offender used hate language, (2) the offender left hate signs or symbols at the scene, or (3) police investigators confirmed that it was a hate crime. In addition to the three types of evidence that were used to classify incidents as hate crimes, victims may have additional reasons for believing that the victimization was bias-motivated. In addition to these three reasons, victims could have reported that-- * the offender committed similar hate crimes or crimes of bigotry in the past * the incident occurred on or near a holiday, event, location, gathering place, or building commonly associated with a specific group (e.g., at a gay pride march, synagogue, Korean church, etc.) * other hate crimes or crimes of prejudice or bigotry happened to the victim or occurred in the neighborhood * their feelings, instincts, or perception lead them to suspect this incident was a hate crime or crime of prejudice or bigotry, even though there was not enough evidence to know for sure. During 2011-15, about 83% of hate crime victims offered one or more additional reasons for believing the crime was motivated by hate beyond the type of evidence required for classification. More than 60% had a feeling or instinct that the crime was motivated by hate. Thirty percent reported the offender had previously committed crimes of prejudice or bigotry, and 18% stated that a hate crime had previously happened in the area. About 5% of victims said that the incident occurred near a holiday, event, location, gathering, or building commonly associated with a specific group. Although 7% of hate crimes were confirmed by police investigators, 22% of hate crime victims told police that they believed the incident was a hate crime (not shown). About 91% of persons who reported these other types of evidence also reported one of the three needed to classify them as a victim of hate crime for the NCVS. If the NCVS standard was relaxed to include these other types of evidence, it would not have a statistically significant impact on the average annual number of hate crime victimizations. During 2011-15, there were about 254,200 hate crime victimizations each year using the expanded evidence categories, which is not statistically different from the 236,100 under the current definition. ***************************************************** The Bureau of Justice Statistics of the U.S. Department of Justice is the principal federal agency responsible for measuring crime, criminal victimization, criminal offenders, victims of crime, correlates of crime, and the operation of criminal and civil justice systems at the federal, state, tribal, and local levels. BJS collects, analyzes, and disseminates reliable and valid statistics on crime and justice systems in the United States, supports improvements to state and local criminal justice information systems, and participates with national and international organizations to develop and recommend national standards for justice statistics. Jeri M. Mulrow is acting director. This report was written by Madeline Masucci and Lynn Langton. Barbara Oudekerk verified the report. Caitlin Scoville and Jill Thomas edited the report. Tina Dorsey produced the report. June 2017, NCJ 250653 ***************************************************** Office of Justice Programs Building Solutions • Supporting Communities • Advancing Justice www.ojp.usdoj.gov ********************************* 5/25/2017 JER 9:20am *********************************