The incidence of hate crime in California declined in 2005, the fourth year in a row that reported hate crimes have dropped, according to a recent announcement by state Attorney General Bill Lockyer.
“The 10-year data shows that the number of offenses and victims are at their lowest levels. The decreases reflect the hard work of law enforcement and our communities to stamp out these intolerable, bias-motivated crimes,”” Lockyer said in a statement.
Solano County reported 11 hate crime events, 13 offenses, 13 victims and 15 known suspects for 2005. The Vallejo and Benicia police departments reported no hate crimes in the study.
Some 275 hate crimes were reported in the nine Bay Area counties, with 111 of those in San Francisco, according to the report.
Hate crime events, which may have more than one victim or include more than one offense, declined along with the total hate crime offenses in the state, according to the attorney general”s office.
Of the 1,691 hate crime offenses reported in 2005, most were due to a victim”s perceived race, ethnicity or national origin, according to the recently released report “Hate Crime in California: 2005.””
At 35.9 percent of the total, by far the majority of those offenses were motivated by anti-black bias.
Some 147 hate crime events, or 10.5 percent of the total, were motivated by anti-Hispanic bias. Anti-Hispanic hate crime events increased 6.5 percent since 2004, according to Lockyer”s office.
Among crimes motivated by religion, 10.1 percent of all hate crime events were motivated by anti-Jewish bias. Anti-Islamic, anti-Catholic and anti-Protestant hate crimes each amounted to less than 1 percent of the total number of hate crimes, according to the report.
Anti-gay crimes amounted to 18.3 percent of all reported hate crime events, with 161, or 11.5 percent of the total, motivated by anti-gay male bias, and 40 crimes, or 2.9 percent of the total, motivated by bias against lesbians. Other crimes motivated by sexual orientation were committed because of homosexual bias in general or bias against heterosexuals or bisexuals.
Some 13 crimes were prompted by bias against transgender people.
Three hate crimes because of anti-physical disability bias were reported.
Two-thirds of reported hate crimes involved violence ranging from murder to aggravated assault to intimidation while some 32.7 percent of hate crimes involved vandalism or the destruction of property, according to the report.
Most hate crime events took place in the home or a residence”s driveway (29.5 percent); on a street, highway or other roadway (26.6 percent); at a school or college (10.9 percent); or in a parking lot or garage (7.7 percent).
