Hate Crime Fact Sheet, 2002
Uniform Crime Reporting Program Releases Hate Crime Statistics
for 2002
Washington, DC -- Today, the FBI's Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program
released its annual report, Hate Crime Statistics, 2002. The publication
revealed that during 2002, 12,073 local and state law enforcement agencies
reported 7,462 hate crime incidents (7,459 single-bias incidents and
3 multiple-bias incidents) that involved 8,832 offenses committed by
7,314 offenders.
A review of the 7,459 single-bias hate crime incidents showed that 48.8
percent were racially motivated, 19.1 percent were based on a bias against
a religious group, 16.7 percent were motivated by a bias against a sexual
orientation, 14.8 percent resulted from an ethnicity/national origin
bias, and 0.6 percent were based on a disability bias.
Of the 8,832 hate crime offenses reported in 2002, 67.5 percent were
crimes against persons, 32.0 percent were crimes against property, and
less than 1 percent were crimes against society. Intimidation was the
most frequently reported crime against persons at 52.1 percent. The offense
of destruction/damage/vandalism, at 83.1 percent, was the most often
reported crime against property.
According to the UCR Program, a victim may be either a person, a business,
an institute, or society as a whole. In 2002, there were 9,222 victims
of hate crimes. Of these, 9,211 were victims of single-bias incidents,
and 11 were victims of multiple-bias incidents. A breakdown of the data
regarding victims in single-bias incidents revealed that 49.7 percent
were victims of racial bias, 18.0 percent were victims of religious bias,
16.4 percent were victims of sexual-orientation bias, 15.3 percent were
victims of ethnicity/national origin bias, and less than 1 percent were
victims of disability bias.
Eleven of the hate crime victims in 2002 were murdered. Four of these
murders were associated with a racial bias, 4 with a sexual-orientation
bias, 2 with an ethnicity/national origin bias, and 1 with a religious
bias.
There were 7,314 known offenders reported in connection with the 7,462
hate crime incidents. The UCR Program collected data on these offenders'
races that showed that 61.8 percent were white, 21.8 percent were black,
1.2 percent were Asian/Pacific Islander, and 0.6 percent were American
Indian/Alaskan Native. Groups comprised of individuals of varying races
made up 4.9 percent of the offenders. The remaining 9.8 percent of offenders
were of unknown races.
An analysis of the data detailing the locations of the hate crime incidents
showed that the majority, 29.5 percent, occurred in residences or homes.
Highways, roads, alleys, or streets accounted for the locations of
20.0 percent of the incidents; schools or colleges composed the settings
of 10.6 percent of the incidents; and parking lots or garages made
up the locations of 6.2 percent of the incidents. The remaining percent
were incidents distributed among various locations.
Of the 12,073 participating agencies that submitted hate crime data
to the UCR Program in 2002, approximately 15.5 percent reported at least
one hate crime in their jurisdictions. The number of participating agencies
in 2002 increased 0.7 percent from the number of agencies that participated
in 2001.
The complete report,
Hate Crime Statistics, 2002, is available on the FBI’s Internet site at <www.fbi.gov/ucr/ucr.htm>.