Hate Crime

Hate incidents and hate crime are acts of violence or hostility directed at people because of who they are or who someone thinks they are. For example, you may have been verbally abused by someone in the street because you're disabled or someone thought you were gay. If you have experienced a hate incident or hate crime you can report it to the police.

Read this page to find out more about hate incidents and hate crime.

What are hate incidents?

The police and Crown Prosecution Service have agreed a common definition of hate incidents.

They say something is a hate incident if the victim or anyone else think it was motivated by hostility or prejudice based on one of the following things:

• disability
• race
• religion
• transgender identity
• sexual orientation

This means that if you believe something is a hate incident it should be recorded as such by the person you are reporting it to. All police forces record hate incidents based on these five personal characteristics.

Anyone can be the victim of a hate incident. For example, you may have been targeted because someone thought you were gay even though you're not, or because you have a disabled child.

Other personal characteristics

Some police forces also record hate incidents based on other personal characteristics such as age.

In particular, Greater Manchester Police now recognises alternative sub-culture hate incidents. These are incidents based on someone's appearance and include Goths, Emos, Punks and other similar groups. This means they will also record any such incidents as a hate incident.

What type of incidents can be a hate incident?

Hate incidents can take many forms. Here are examples of hate incidents:

• verbal abuse like name-calling and offensive jokes
• harassment
• bullying or intimidation by children, adults, neighbours or strangers
• physical attacks such as hitting, punching, pushing, spitting
• threats of violence
• hoax calls, abusive phone or text messages, hate mail
• online abuse for example on Facebook or Twitter
• displaying or circulating discriminatory literature or posters
• harm or damage to things such as your home, pet, vehicle
• graffiti
• arson
• throwing rubbish into a garden
• malicious complaints for example over parking, smells or noise

When is a hate incident also a hate crime?

When hate incidents become criminal offences they are known as hate crimes. A criminal offence is something which breaks the law of the land.

Any criminal offence can be a hate crime if it was carried out because of hostility or prejudice based on disability, race, religion, transgender identity or sexual orientation.

When something is classed as a hate crime, the judge can impose a tougher sentence on the offender under the Criminal Justice Act 2003.

Incidents which are based on other personal characteristics, such as age and belonging to an alternative subculture, are not considered to be hate crimes under the law. You can still report these, but they will not be prosecuted specifically as hate crimes by the police and the Crown Prosecution Service.

Examples of hate crimes

Here are examples of hate crimes:

• assaults
• criminal damage
• harassment
• murder
• sexual assault
• theft
• fraud
• burglary
• hate mail (Malicious Communications Act 1988)
• causing harassment, alarm or distress (Public Order Act 1986)

What to do if you are a victim of hate crime

The most important thing to do is tell someone. Surrey Police take reports of hate crimes very seriously and are committed to reducing the harm that hate crime causes victims.

Some victims of hate crime may be reluctant to contact police for a number of reasons:

• mistrust in or fear of the police
• social or cultural barriers
• fear of not being believed
• not willing to waste police time on a matter that others might think as trivial
• fear of reprisals or further incidents if they report the matter to the police

For those who do not wish to speak to the police, there are other agencies or organisations that victims of hate crime can turn to.

• Stop Hate UK
• True Vision
• Citizens Advice
• Crimestoppers

What happens when you report a hate crime

After contacting Surrey Police, a call taker will taker details of the incident, with their first priority being the safety of the victim.

Based on the information provided, a risk assessment will be undertaken to calculate how the police will respond to the incident. If there is imminent risk to the victim, or the suspect is still on the scene, officers will attend as soon as possible. This is referred to as a Grade 1 incident.

If the risk to the victim is reduced, but there is a chance that evidence may be lost, officers will attend when a unit becomes available. This is referred to as a Grade 2 Incident.

If the incident reported is historic or there little or no risk to the victim and the investigation would be better served with a slow time response, officers will usually attend within 24 hours. This is referred to as a Grade 3 incident.

If the matter reported is a Hate Incident, where no crimes have been identified and there is no risk to the person reporting, police will usually just take a report over the telephone. This is referred to as a Grade 4 incident.

If the matter reported involves a criminal offence being committed, officers will speak to the victim and will usually take a statement. They will also complete a hate and anti-social behaviour risk assessment with the victim to ascertain if they have been a victim of hate crime in the past and to ascertain the impact the event has had on the victim, their family and the community as a whole.

Officers will also look for other sources of evidence. Depending on the crime, this may include:

• CCTV
• other witnesses
• social media posts
• forensics

If a suspect can be identified, the police will seek to interview them over their involvement in the matter. If there is sufficient evidence to prove they have committed an offence then the suspect will be dealt with in the most appropriate manner (the wishes of the victim are usually taken into account).