NCJ Number
200991
Date Published
2001
Length
49 pages
Annotation
This report details the prevalence of bias and hate-motivated crime in Massachusetts' secondary schools.
Abstract
Hate crimes are defined as criminal offenses committed against a person, property, or society which are motivated by the offender's bias against a race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, or ethnic or national origin. This document presents a brief literature review of previous work focused on explaining the reasons for and prevalence of hate-related crimes. A survey was administered in 30 Massachusetts secondary schools, and the questionnaire focused on four primary types of issues, including student characteristics, crime victimization, reporting of crime, and students' attitudes and perceptions of school climate. Survey results indicate that multiple bias crimes were found in all of the 30 schools that participated in the survey, with certain groups of individuals, such as African-American and Asian-American students falling victim to disproportionate amounts of hate crime. Homosexual, bisexual, and disabled students and members of religious minority groups, such as Jewish students, also reported high levels of hate-motivated crimes against them. Massachusetts bias crime education and prevention programming needs to be re-examined in order to insure that effective hate-crime strategies are in place in secondary schools. References