This Fact Sheet presents an overview of the features of the U.S. Justice Department’s Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention’s (OJJDP’s) Preventing Youth Hate Crimes & Identity-Based Bullying Initiative.
One feature of this Initiative is a comprehensive literature review that addresses the topic of hate crime. This includes a graph of reported hate crime offenses in 2015 and 2020, showing that in 2013, 5,814 known individuals committed 6,933 hate crime offenses that impacted 7,242 victims. When age was reported, juveniles accounted for 32 percent of known persons who offended and 16 percent of the victims. In 2020, 6,780 known individuals committed 11,129 hate crime offenses that affected 11, 472 victims. When age was reported, juveniles accounted for 10.9 percent of known persons who offended and 9.4 percent of the victims. This Fact Sheet also reports on a Virtual Symposium that covered current trends and research on identity-based bullying, cyberbullying, and how hate groups use social media to radicalize youth. Between November 2021 and September 2022, OJJDP hosted 13 online presentations as part of the Initiative’s webinar series. The series was tailored to three audiences and covered topics such as school safety, implicit bias, and extremist hate groups. Other features of the Initiative have included the development of a Prevention-based curriculum that addresses bias, bullying, and hate; conflict and communication; media literacy; extremism and youth; cyberhate and counter-speech; and building a respectful community.