Photo provided courtesy of Unsplash.com
By Elizabeth Echard, Staff Writer
Hate crime statutes were originally created to deter and punish crimes that were fueled by bias against the victim based on their race, color, religion, national origin, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation or disability.[1] The purpose of hate crime statutes is to heighten the level of punishment in order to account for the prejudicial motivation to commit the crime.[2] One example of a hate crime would be a white man walking through a neighborhood and being brutally assaulted and injured by a group of black men, simply because the white man was “trespassing” in a “black” neighborhood.[3] However, now, with the influx of law enforcement officers being targets of crime, some states are considering and implementing changes to their hate crime statutes, allowing these statutes to include crimes motivated by bias against law enforcement.[4] [5] [6]
In January 2020, the state of Alabama introduced a new bill that would, if passed, increase the penalties associated with crimes that target law enforcement officers.[7] Under Alabama’s hate crime statutes, there is a heightened penalty offered for a crime committed because of prejudicial bias.[8] Alabama’s new bill, should it pass, will impose the same heightened penalties upon defendants who commit crimes against law enforcement agents motivated by their status as a police officer as if the defendant targeted the officer for their race, color, or religion.[9] The Alabama legislators feel that the passage of this bill is necessary to curb violence against law enforcement.[10] The Alabama bill would require “mandatory minimum sentences [for crimes targeting law enforcement], including 15 years for a class A felony, ten years for a class B felony, 2 years for a class C felony, 18 months for a class D felony and three months for a misdemeanor.”[11] Alabama’s legislative action comes after Louisiana became the first state to classify targeting police officer a hate crime in 2016.[12]
This bill comes with controversial connotations. Some lawmakers feel that this type of response is necessary after a horrific targeting of police officers occurs in their state, while others may not have personally experienced this type of targeting and may, on the other hand, feel uncomfortable with legislating specific intent for a crime.[13] Members of the Blue Lives Matter movement support these types of bills because they believe that these types of laws “symbolically advise that there is a value to the lives of police officers.”[14] Conversely, opponents of this legislation, from groups like Black Lives Matter, believe that it is unnecessary as many states already have heightened penalties for crimes involving police officers.[15] Furthermore, some states, such as Pennsylvania, have taken a different approach by introducing legislation to make a case targeting law enforcement deemed a capital case, where imposing the death penalty is an option.[16]
All in all, this is an interesting area to see where lawmakers’ motives lie for backing these types of bills. It should be educational as the years go on to monitor this situation and see which states take which actions and why. While it is debated if the number of police officer deaths has increased or decreased,[17] the motives behind the deaths and attacks is what these bills are really bringing into question.
[1] Learn About Hate Crimes, United States Department of Justice, https://www.justice.gov/hatecrimes/learn-about-hate-crimes (2020).
[2] Id.
[3] Id.
[4] https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/crime/bs-md-ci-cr-police-feeling-under-siege-20190830-goyqxlkqcrh4dch5ztkitrx5yy-story.html
[5] https://philadelphia.cbslocal.com/2019/08/14/crowd-taunts-philadelphia-police-officers-laugh-at-them-in-midst-of-gunfire-during-standoff-in-nicetown-tioga/
[7]https://abc3340.com/news/local/bill-seeks-to-increase-penalties-for-crimes-targeting-law-enforcement-officers
[8] Id.
[9] Id.
[10] Id.
[11] Id.
[12] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/07/08/the-state-where-targeting-a-police-officer-is-a-hate-crime/
[13] Id.
[14] Id.
[15] Id.
[16] Id.
[17] Id.
