Hate crimes against "the homeless"

[OKTexas]

Fat people?

Actually, in Britain at least, there is a hate crime law for obese people.



The problem is, how do we differentiate between the homeless that are... I guess honest? The ones who are there not of their own fault, but because something terrible happened to them and forced them on the streets.

Furthermore, I remember hearing on my local talk radio that one problem homeless people have is that they can't get a job because they're homeless, and to stop being homeless they need a job.

Anyway, the problem with the hate crime law is twofold:
First of all, how is killing, say, a gay person so much worse than killing a straight person? Why do there have to be special provisions in place for that?

Secondly, how do you prove a hate crime? If a psychopath walks up and shoots a black man, is it because he hates blacks or because he's crazy? And ultimately, what does it matter, because the crazy in question up and shot somebody!

We'd be lying if we said that there weren't people out there who did specifically target gays or women or blacks or prostitutes. These people are evil, and there's no justification for targeting a specific group of people to terrorize or kill. If you're killing gay people in alleys at night, that makes you a murderer; how does it being labeled a hate crime make that any different?

I do have a guess about it, though, and I'd like opinions on the matter:
It's my guess that "Hate Crimes" were put into place because there was, say, a large uprising of crimes targeting specific groups of people. Not just murder, of course - assault, B&E, harassment, etc. Because of this, laws were put into place to emphasize to people "Hey, if you mess with gays/latinos/women, you'll be punished harder than if you did it to anyone else." It was meant as a deterrent, to try and cut down on crime against specific groups.

Does that make sense?
But that said, isn't it obvious, that if someone really hates gay people and wants to beat up every single one he comes across, they're going to do it regardless of what the law says?

A hate crime is as defined by Wisconsin v. Mitchell.

Hate speech, which is protected free expression, is as defined by R.A.V. v. City of St. Paul (1992).

The former concerns seeking out and committing a crime against a person solely due to his race, sexual orientation, or station in life. The latter involves hate speech which is protected because no imminent lawlessness can occur.

The issue, therefore, has nothing to do with a crime being ‘worse’ because the victim was a gay person, but that a criminal singled-out a victim solely because he was gay – or homeless, for that matter – and was motivated to cause harm to that individual because of his sexual orientation.

Again, for decades, indeed centuries, judges have taken infamous or heinous aspects of a crime into consideration when contemplating sentencing.

As the Mitchell Court noted:

In determining what sentence to impose, sentencing judges have traditionally considered a wide variety of factors in addition to evidence bearing on guilt, including a defendant's motive for committing the offense. While it is equally true that a sentencing judge may not take into consideration a defendant's abstract beliefs, however obnoxious to most people, the Constitution does not erect a per se barrier to the admission of evidence concerning one's beliefs and associations at sentencing simply because they are protected by the First Amendment.

Wisconsin v. Mitchell, 508 U.S. 47 (1993).

Enhanced sentencing thus does not constitute a ‘special provision’ for any class of persons.

Note also that the ruling was unanimous, written by Chief Justice Rehnquist.

Unanimous, as in the likes of Scalia and Thomas concurred.

There are no legal foundations whatsoever for conservatives to object to enhanced sentencing on Constitutional grounds.

Of course that would depend on how the law was constructed, should it provide a special provision for a particular protected class, such as the homeless, I can see an arguement on Constitutional grounds.

 

[AmyNation]

Yes, hate crimes provide for enhanced punishment based on how the defendant felt about the victim.

Virtually all crimes are committed out of some degree of "hate." The law has decided that some forms of hate are worse than others and deserve added punishment. You may not agree with that, but it is the law - and I agree with it fully. To me, a cretin who drags a black man behind his pickup truck because he hates blacks is far, far worse than a guy who beats another guy up because he thinks the other guy has been sleeping with his wife.

In the latter case, one can see a rational reason for what happened. In the former, no rational reason at all appears, other than bigotry and prejudice. Don't you see that disctinction?

You never answered my question: How can a person be against hate crime legislation and not be in favor of the commission of hate crimes?

Are you serious?

Because this person recognizes that hate crimes laws are thought crime laws, and it's not acceptable to me to punish thought.

Dead serious. Hate crime legislation increases punishment for racially motivated crimes on the theory that increasing the punishment will decrease the commission of hate crimes. Take away the hate crime legislation, and you take away the deterrent to commit the hate crime. More hate crimes will then be committed.

I say again: How can you be against hate crime legislation, knowing that if it is abolished, hate crimes will increase, and not be in favor of the commission of hate crimes?

I dont accept your straw man.

 

[George Costanza]

(sigh) No, sweet thing, not all "assault is assault" in the context of hate crime legislation. See, this is what I was saying when I said that if you can't see this, there is little point in trying to get you to understand hate crimes and hate crime legislation.

You say "murder is murder." Really? There are basically three different degrees of murder - capital murder, first degree murder and second degree murder. In California, a first degree murder committed under certain circumstances is considered a special circumstances case and bears the death penalty. Plain, old first degree murder without special circumstances is 25 to life. Second degree murder is 15 to life.

Would you lump all three of these type of murder together with the same sentence regardless? And what would that sentence be? Death? That would mean the death penalty for a mass murderer as well as a guy who didn't like the loud music from his neighbor and went next door with a gun. Obviously inappropriate. 15 to life? For the mass murderer as well as the guy who popped his neighbor because of the loud music?

Please.

I know all about it george.

yes.. i would lump all three degrees of murder into .... one sentence. Murder. Enhance it all.


and if your guy who popped his neighbor hated him at the moment of the popping.... then what? I am pretty sure it could be argued that he DID hate the guy at the time of the popping....enough so that he killed someone.

it's not about hating an individual. it's about one's prejudices, whether racial hatred or hatred of gays or the like is the precipitating factor in the crime. it's not about robbing someone of a different color. it's about victimizing someone BECAUSE of whatever protected class they're a part of. it's really no different from measuring intent in any other act... but if a group of people beat some guy BECAUSE he's gay, (e.g. matthew shepard) then those people deserve an extra punishment...

it's a deterrence issue.

The best example I can think of is: Beating up a gay person because he is kicking your dog is not a hate crime. Beating up a gay person because he is gay is a hate crime.

They just can't see it Jillian.

 

[syrenn]

Wrong. Not all assaults on the homeless would be classified as hate crimes under the proposed legislation. Example: I look out my window and see a homeless guy kicking my dog. I go out and cold cock the son of a bitch. That isn't a hate crime, because I was not attacking him because he was a homeless person, only because he was kicking my dog.

On the other side of the coin, suppose a homeless man assaults you because you are a woman and for no other reason. You haven't been doing anything to him - you were just walking by on the sidewalk. That would be a hate crime. Attacks based in whole or in part on the basis of gender are included in most hate crime statutes.

Read my post, above, about why hate crime legislation does not violate the Equal Protection clause.

My assault at the hands of anyone will not kick in a hate crime. I know for a fact.

I am a white woman with a home. I am not "special" under hate crime legislature. No DA will ever be able to prove he attacked my because of my gender. Can you show me one example of such a prosecution. Man charged with hate crime because he targeted only women?

George, the laws in place are already able to ante up the stakes for those who attack someone for no other reason than their race etc....

Tell me, do you belong to an organized religion? If so, and you are attacked because of that, it's a hate crime. As I said before, gender is considered a protected class under most hate crime statutes. Therefore, like it or not, you ARE "special" under hate crime protection statutes. Didn't know that, did you?

No, the laws in place need to be beefed up when it comes to hate crimes. Bigots who attack others for racial, sexual orientation, religious or gender reasons are much worse than people who attack others for lesser, more rational reasons, and deserve tougher punishment.

so all you have to do is argue you had a rational reason for beating someone to a pulp?

 

[syrenn]

(sigh) No, sweet thing, not all "assault is assault" in the context of hate crime legislation. See, this is what I was saying when I said that if you can't see this, there is little point in trying to get you to understand hate crimes and hate crime legislation.

You say "murder is murder." Really? There are basically three different degrees of murder - capital murder, first degree murder and second degree murder. In California, a first degree murder committed under certain circumstances is considered a special circumstances case and bears the death penalty. Plain, old first degree murder without special circumstances is 25 to life. Second degree murder is 15 to life.

Would you lump all three of these type of murder together with the same sentence regardless? And what would that sentence be? Death? That would mean the death penalty for a mass murderer as well as a guy who didn't like the loud music from his neighbor and went next door with a gun. Obviously inappropriate. 15 to life? For the mass murderer as well as the guy who popped his neighbor because of the loud music?

Please.

I know all about it george.

yes.. i would lump all three degrees of murder into .... one sentence. Murder. Enhance it all.


and if your guy who popped his neighbor hated him at the moment of the popping.... then what? I am pretty sure it could be argued that he DID hate the guy at the time of the popping....enough so that he killed someone.

it's not about hating an individual. it's about one's prejudices, whether racial hatred or hatred of gays or the like is the precipitating factor in the crime. it's not about robbing someone of a different color. it's about victimizing someone BECAUSE of whatever protected class they're a part of. it's really no different from measuring intent in any other act... but if a group of people beat some guy BECAUSE he's gay, (e.g. matthew shepard) then those people deserve an extra punishment...

it's a deterrence issue.

i understand all of that jillian....

i aslo understand how it is being used as a deterrence..... so why not deter it ALL and just maxi it all up to enhanced levels??? Shouldn't that deter the non hate crimes?

 

[Dreamy]

Wrong. Not all assaults on the homeless would be classified as hate crimes under the proposed legislation. Example: I look out my window and see a homeless guy kicking my dog. I go out and cold cock the son of a bitch. That isn't a hate crime, because I was not attacking him because he was a homeless person, only because he was kicking my dog.

On the other side of the coin, suppose a homeless man assaults you because you are a woman and for no other reason. You haven't been doing anything to him - you were just walking by on the sidewalk. That would be a hate crime. Attacks based in whole or in part on the basis of gender are included in most hate crime statutes.

Read my post, above, about why hate crime legislation does not violate the Equal Protection clause.

My assault at the hands of anyone will not kick in a hate crime. I know for a fact.

I am a white woman with a home. I am not "special" under hate crime legislature. No DA will ever be able to prove he attacked my because of my gender. Can you show me one example of such a prosecution. Man charged with hate crime because he targeted only women?

George, the laws in place are already able to ante up the stakes for those who attack someone for no other reason than their race etc....

Tell me, do you belong to an organized religion? If so, and you are attacked because of that, it's a hate crime. As I said before, gender is considered a protected class under most hate crime statutes. Therefore, like it or not, you ARE "special" under hate crime protection statutes. Didn't know that, did you?

No, the laws in place need to be beefed up when it comes to hate crimes. Bigots who attack others for racial, sexual orientation, religious or gender reasons are much worse than people who attack others for lesser, more rational reasons, and deserve tougher punishment.

So both genders are "special"? If so then why the need for hate crime legislature?

So a guy, say a junkie sometimes homeless, who hangs around the financial district targeting wealthy white men to roll and rob is committing no hate crime because....?

Once again please show me a case where a man was charged a hate crime for attacking a woman or women?

 

[OKTexas]

The elements of a crime are actus reas(the act) and mens rea(guilty mind/intent). It is neither right or left it is a system the US adopted based on English Common law.

No some crimes are motivated by greed, lust....etc.

So greed or lust are less depraved than hate I guess, and lawyers wonder whay everyone hates lawyers, they have such a wonderful way of screwing up justice.

I wonder if the members of the various classes protected by hate crime statutes hate lawyers for "screwing up justice." I wonder how many people out there "hate lawyers" for screwing up their fun when it comes to the enactment of hate crime legislation.

Where'd you say you live . . . . . ?

Laws are to get justice for a victim, I can't think of one law that hasn't been broken, so they don't protect anyone. And we don't have classes or should I say we're no suposed to have classes of people. Remember lady justice is suposed to be blind and treat everyone equally, be they criminal or victim. Of course the next step is to start punishing speach, oh wait that is exactly what this does, should you utter the wrong phrase. Also these laws can't be applied to the protected classes, like the blacks that drug a white guy out of his car and beat him withing an inch of his life while using racial slurs. Everyone is granted equal protection, not superior protection, under the law.

 

[jillian]

I just love the circular logic of the left. Crime is by definition an action, or exhibition as you put it, that is what is punished, motive should have nothing to do with the punishment, only the act itself. A crime against a person is by definition a hateful act, so I guess all crimes against people should carry enhanced sentences. Right?

The elements of a crime are actus reas(the act) and mens rea(guilty mind/intent). It is neither right or left it is a system the US adopted based on English Common law.

No some crimes are motivated by greed, lust....etc.

So greed or lust are less depraved than hate I guess, and lawyers wonder whay everyone hates lawyers, they have such a wonderful way of screwing up justice.

 

[jillian]

I know all about it george.

yes.. i would lump all three degrees of murder into .... one sentence. Murder. Enhance it all.


and if your guy who popped his neighbor hated him at the moment of the popping.... then what? I am pretty sure it could be argued that he DID hate the guy at the time of the popping....enough so that he killed someone.

it's not about hating an individual. it's about one's prejudices, whether racial hatred or hatred of gays or the like is the precipitating factor in the crime. it's not about robbing someone of a different color. it's about victimizing someone BECAUSE of whatever protected class they're a part of. it's really no different from measuring intent in any other act... but if a group of people beat some guy BECAUSE he's gay, (e.g. matthew shepard) then those people deserve an extra punishment...

it's a deterrence issue.

i understand all of that jillian....

i aslo understand how it is being used as a deterrence..... so why not deter it ALL and just maxi it all up to enhanced levels??? Shouldn't that deter the non hate crimes?

because there were places in this country where people routinely victimized people because of what they were born. it's a message sent that society won't tolerate that type of hate.

 

[syrenn]

it's not about hating an individual. it's about one's prejudices, whether racial hatred or hatred of gays or the like is the precipitating factor in the crime. it's not about robbing someone of a different color. it's about victimizing someone BECAUSE of whatever protected class they're a part of. it's really no different from measuring intent in any other act... but if a group of people beat some guy BECAUSE he's gay, (e.g. matthew shepard) then those people deserve an extra punishment...

it's a deterrence issue.

i understand all of that jillian....

i aslo understand how it is being used as a deterrence..... so why not deter it ALL and just maxi it all up to enhanced levels??? Shouldn't that deter the non hate crimes?

because there were places in this country where people routinely victimized people because of what they were born. it's a message sent that society won't tolerate that type of hate.

so its not about the crime but the message being sent.... not good in terms of justice and equality.

The point and or message should be.... we wont tolerate criminal behavior and violence... for any reason.

 

[Si modo]

There is a difference between bashing up some random person, and targeting a person because they are black. Searching out a black person, or a gay person with the intention of beating them up is a worse crime.

Not all rapes are treated equally, because some are worse than others. Likewise, some assaults are worse than others.

there is NO difference....

crime is crime.

There is a difference.

Case one: John hits Jack while drunk, because he believes that Jack is sleeping with his wife. Jack falls back and splits his head open.

Case two: Mark hates blacks, and sets out one night with the intention of assaulting a black person. He finds Bill, and shoves him. Bill falls down, hits his head on the curb, and splits his head open.

One of the above cases is worse than the other.

Case three: Mary invites Craig back home with the intention of sleeping with him. Halfway through, she changes her mind, but Craig continues, even though Mary is struggling against him.

Case four: Lucy is walking home from a bar one night, when she is attacked by Martin, who has been waiting in the bushes for a lone woman to pass by.

Again, one of those cases is worse than the other.

I guarantee you that a black man's cracked head feels just as bad to him as a white man's cracked head feels to him.

 

[Noomi]

there is NO difference....

crime is crime.

There is a difference.

Case one: John hits Jack while drunk, because he believes that Jack is sleeping with his wife. Jack falls back and splits his head open.

Case two: Mark hates blacks, and sets out one night with the intention of assaulting a black person. He finds Bill, and shoves him. Bill falls down, hits his head on the curb, and splits his head open.

One of the above cases is worse than the other.

Case three: Mary invites Craig back home with the intention of sleeping with him. Halfway through, she changes her mind, but Craig continues, even though Mary is struggling against him.

Case four: Lucy is walking home from a bar one night, when she is attacked by Martin, who has been waiting in the bushes for a lone woman to pass by.

Again, one of those cases is worse than the other.

I disagree, the first two are aggravated assult with bodly injury, the other two are rape. You punish actions, not thought.

But one assault would be seen as being more serious in a court of law - and so would one of those rapes.

 

[Noomi]

I guarantee you that a black man's cracked head feels just as bad to him as a white man's cracked head feels to him.

That isn't my point. Take those cases to court and the judge will see one case as being more severe than the other. The assailants in both cases will not get the same punishment, which proves my point that one assault is, indeed, worse than the other.

 

[Si modo]

Fat people?

Actually, in Britain at least, there is a hate crime law for obese people.



The problem is, how do we differentiate between the homeless that are... I guess honest? The ones who are there not of their own fault, but because something terrible happened to them and forced them on the streets.

Furthermore, I remember hearing on my local talk radio that one problem homeless people have is that they can't get a job because they're homeless, and to stop being homeless they need a job.

Anyway, the problem with the hate crime law is twofold:
First of all, how is killing, say, a gay person so much worse than killing a straight person? Why do there have to be special provisions in place for that?

Secondly, how do you prove a hate crime? If a psychopath walks up and shoots a black man, is it because he hates blacks or because he's crazy? And ultimately, what does it matter, because the crazy in question up and shot somebody!

We'd be lying if we said that there weren't people out there who did specifically target gays or women or blacks or prostitutes. These people are evil, and there's no justification for targeting a specific group of people to terrorize or kill. If you're killing gay people in alleys at night, that makes you a murderer; how does it being labeled a hate crime make that any different?

I do have a guess about it, though, and I'd like opinions on the matter:
It's my guess that "Hate Crimes" were put into place because there was, say, a large uprising of crimes targeting specific groups of people. Not just murder, of course - assault, B&E, harassment, etc. Because of this, laws were put into place to emphasize to people "Hey, if you mess with gays/latinos/women, you'll be punished harder than if you did it to anyone else." It was meant as a deterrent, to try and cut down on crime against specific groups.

Does that make sense?
But that said, isn't it obvious, that if someone really hates gay people and wants to beat up every single one he comes across, they're going to do it regardless of what the law says?

A hate crime is as defined by Wisconsin v. Mitchell.

Hate speech, which is protected free expression, is as defined by R.A.V. v. City of St. Paul (1992).

The former concerns seeking out and committing a crime against a person solely due to his race, sexual orientation, or station in life. The latter involves hate speech which is protected because no imminent lawlessness can occur.

The issue, therefore, has nothing to do with a crime being ‘worse’ because the victim was a gay person, but that a criminal singled-out a victim solely because he was gay – or homeless, for that matter – and was motivated to cause harm to that individual because of his sexual orientation.

Again, for decades, indeed centuries, judges have taken infamous or heinous aspects of a crime into consideration when contemplating sentencing.

As the Mitchell Court noted:

In determining what sentence to impose, sentencing judges have traditionally considered a wide variety of factors in addition to evidence bearing on guilt, including a defendant's motive for committing the offense. While it is equally true that a sentencing judge may not take into consideration a defendant's abstract beliefs, however obnoxious to most people, the Constitution does not erect a per se barrier to the admission of evidence concerning one's beliefs and associations at sentencing simply because they are protected by the First Amendment.

Wisconsin v. Mitchell, 508 U.S. 47 (1993).

Enhanced sentencing thus does not constitute a ‘special provision’ for any class of persons.

Note also that the ruling was unanimous, written by Chief Justice Rehnquist.

Unanimous, as in the likes of Scalia and Thomas concurred.

There are no legal foundations whatsoever for conservatives to object to enhanced sentencing on Constitutional grounds.

Cool.

Then there is no need to codify it as common law covers it.

 

[Si modo]

I guarantee you that a black man's cracked head feels just as bad to him as a white man's cracked head feels to him.

That isn't my point. Take those cases to court and the judge will see one case as being more severe than the other. The assailants in both cases will not get the same punishment, which proves my point that one assault is, indeed, worse than the other.

Without going too much into the logical failure of your last sentence, as someone has already posted: Of course some crimes are more heinous than others. That is decided on a case-by-case basis, as it ALWAYS has been in common law societies.

Thus, there is zero need to codify it, ESPECIALLY when the code offers special consideration for only certain persons with the rest getting none of that.

 

[Noomi]

I guarantee you that a black man's cracked head feels just as bad to him as a white man's cracked head feels to him.

That isn't my point. Take those cases to court and the judge will see one case as being more severe than the other. The assailants in both cases will not get the same punishment, which proves my point that one assault is, indeed, worse than the other.

Without going too much into the logical failure of your last sentence, as someone has already posted: Of course some crimes are more heinous than others. That is decided on a case-by-case basis, as it ALWAYS has been in common law societies.

Thus, there is zero need to codify it, ESPECIALLY when the code offers special consideration for only certain persons with the rest getting none of that.

I do tend to think that some crimes, against people of a certain race, or homosexuals, are worse than similar crimes against white people or heterosexuals. I can understand why people don't want one crime to be treated more seriously than others, though.

 

[gallantwarrior]

If that's what it takes to get a bunch of young psychopaths charged as adults who would set a man on fire for fun I am all for it. Google "kids set homeless man on fire", it's a damned epidemic. Anyone who would do something like that needs to be locked up for years and years, not just until they turn 18.

Finally, something we agree on.

 

[gallantwarrior]

The crime should determine the punishment.

Person A sets a homeless man on fire because he hates the homless, person B sets a banker on fire because he hates corporate America. How is person A deserving of a harsher punishment?

I suspect that the attack on the homeless is probably less motivated by hate than the same crime committed against a banker. The homeless make easy targets for nasty, ill-bred hooligans.

 

[Si modo]

That isn't my point. Take those cases to court and the judge will see one case as being more severe than the other. The assailants in both cases will not get the same punishment, which proves my point that one assault is, indeed, worse than the other.

Without going too much into the logical failure of your last sentence, as someone has already posted: Of course some crimes are more heinous than others. That is decided on a case-by-case basis, as it ALWAYS has been in common law societies.

Thus, there is zero need to codify it, ESPECIALLY when the code offers special consideration for only certain persons with the rest getting none of that.

I do tend to think that some crimes, against people of a certain race, or homosexuals, are worse than similar crimes against white people or heterosexuals. I can understand why people don't want one crime to be treated more seriously than others, though.

As do I. As do most judges, too.

I would also imagine that murder of whites simply because they were white by blacks is pretty heinous. Recently there was a real nasty one in KY, I believe.

But, there is no code for THAT situation. How is that fair?

 

[gallantwarrior]

So I can't yell at these bums who stand at the exits of Interstates at a traffic light holding "Homeless and Hungry" signs to get a job? That's not a hate crime in my book; that's a suggestion, which they refuse if you offer them a job, btw.

I saw some in a NH border town where they actually appear to work in shifts. Different "homeless sign carriers" at the traffic island at different times.

I am pretty sure people can yell just not physically abuse others, not just the homeless. I want to know what is the difference in the crime between me, a woman with a home getting assaulted and a homeless man getting assaulted?

Because assaulting a homeless man is now designated a "hate crime".