SPREAD LOVE, NOT HATE—Amenah Tucker holds up the sign that says it all, at the Black Brilliance Collective’s march and rally in Homewood and Point Breeze. The protests that transpired in Charlottesville, Va. prompted a series of anti-hate movements nationwide, including in Pittsburgh. (Photo by Emmai Alaquiva)
by Sherry Stone PHILADELPHIA TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
Pennsylvania was listed among the nation’s top 10 states with the biggest decrease in hate crimes between 2021 and 2022, according to a recent report from Gruber Law Offices based on Federal Bureau of Investigation data.
Hate crimes in Pennsylvania were down 20% between 2021 and 2022, according to the report, which cited reports from law enforcement agencies reporting the crime data to the FBI.
A total of 347 hate crimes, defined by the FBI as “criminal offenses motivated in part or in whole by the offender’s biases against a race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, ethnicity, gender, or gender identity,” were reported in Pennsylvania in 2021, and 278 hate crimes were reported in our state in 2022.
Over the bridge, however, nearby New Jersey reported a 41% increase in hate crimes for this time frame, with a reported 780 cases in 2021 and 1,101 reported in 2022.
Neighboring states Delaware and Maryland also reported an increase in hate crimes for 2021-2022 with Delaware reporting a 78% increase, from 9 instances to 16. In Maryland instances of hate crimes were up 44% from 139 cases in 2021 to 200 in 2022, according to the report.
“The significant decrease in hate crime in certain states,” like Pennsylvania, “suggests a positive development for their residents,” said Attorney David Gruber, founder of Gruber Law Offices, “as it reflects progress in societal attitudes as well as the possible effectiveness of policies targeted toward combating hate crime. However, these statistics are also a reminder for communities to remain vigilant, as many states unfortunately saw an increase in hate crime — and the figures across the nation remained unchanged from 2021-2022.”
According to the FBI, in 2022 most of the instances of hate crimes in Pennsylvania were based upon race, ethnicity and ancestry in the area (67%), followed, by differences in sexual orientation (15.5%) and religion (13.8%), and less commonly based upon disability, gender and gender identity. FBI records also showed that in Pennsylvania, 74.4% of hate crimes were against people whereas crimes against property were involved in 24.9% of hate crimes.
Pennsylvania had a few instances of hate related attacks on residents in recent years.
Last year, a federal jury in Pittsburgh unanimously recommended that a Pennsylvania man be sentenced to death for killing 11 people at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh on Oct. 27, 2018. The assailant entered the house of worship and shot and killed 11 congregants and five law enforcement officers. Evidence showed that the defendant planned his attack based on violently antisemitic beliefs reflected in dozens of online posts.
In one instance of racially motivated harassment, a car full of four white Pennsylvania men were charged with simple assault and harassment for calling an African American student from Lehigh University a racial slur, while he was walking off campus with two white student friends. The African American student ran after the car and hit the trunk in anger. The men in the car responded by parking the car, surrounding him while one of the men hit him, and then chased him onto the Lehigh Valley campus. Once on campus, one of the men pulled out a firearm and waited for the student outside of the locked dorm room, according to the North Hampton County District Attorney’s Office in April 2023.
Amanda Brothman, director of Communications for the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission in Harrisburg, says the commission has warred primarily with racist propaganda since 2021.
“In 2021, Pennsylvania had the highest incidents of white supremacist propaganda distribution of any state in the country — 473 instances of hateful propaganda — signs, stickers, graffiti — nearly 100 more than the next closest state, Virginia. About 90% of the instances were attributed to one group, The Patriot Front, according to the Anti-Defamation League.”
According to Philadelphia police, racist flyers were also distributed on Germantown and Mt. Pleasant avenues last May and taped to poles and trash cans in the city’s Mt. Airy section. Examples of racist propaganda were also reported last year in South Philadelphia, Abington and Wyndmoor.
Nationally, there were a total of 10,530 single-bias hate crimes in 2021, according to the FBI. And in 2022, there were a total of 11,288 single-bias hate crimes in the United States. In 346 incidents, hate crime victims were targeted because of more than one bias like race and religion.
Of the known offenders, nationally, 51% were white, 21% were Black or African American, and 17.4% were of unknown race.
FBI statistics show the vast majority of the offenders, 80.6%, were 18 years of age or older. Roughly 10% of incidents occurred at schools and colleges, nearly 6% of hate crimes occurred in parking garages, about 3.6% occurred at churches, synagogues and mosques, and about 3% occurred on playgrounds.
sstone@phillytrib.com 215-893-5781