The National Fraternal Order of Police has launched a campaign to change federal law to add attacks on police as a hate crime. In a letter to President Barack Obama and Congress, the powerful union cites the murders of two New York City police officers, Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu. The demand would treat an attack based on status as the same as an attack based on race. Given the Administration’s expedited investigations of civil rights violations involving deaths caused by police officers in Missouri and New York, the change would create an interesting situation where both future suspects and officers would be arguably protections under federal hate crime laws.
Currently, the federal law states that it is a “criminal offense against a person or property motivated in whole or in part by an offender’s bias against a race, religion, disability, ethnic origin or sexual orientation.”
Jim Pasco, the executive director of the National Fraternal Order of Police, insisted that “[r]ight now, it’s a hate crime if you attack someone solely because of the color of their skin, but it ought to be a hate crime if you attack someone solely because of the color of their uniform as well.”
Many of us have been alarmed by the intense anti-police rhetoric that has arisen in some protests, including chants for more dead police officers. Despite this sympathy, however, the addition to a status as a hate crime category raises some difficult questions about the expansion of this law, which has been viewed as troubling in many circumstances by civil libertarians.
There have been an alarming increase in the shooting of police officers in the last year. However, there are already ample criminal provisions addressing such crimes, including crimes specifically covering attacks on police offices or fire fighters. Adding a new category to the hate crimes statute is unlikely to offer any additional deference when you already have these laws as well as standard charges for murder etc. The question is whether we want to continue to expand this law to cover attacks allegedly made on the basis of status. There are also questions of what the requisite proof would be in such cases.
There is also an obvious concern that any assault on a police officer could be potentially classified as a hate crime. Citizens often voice contempt or anger at police. In some confrontations, we have seen even the slightest forms of assault charged under existing laws. Some of those cases could not be enhanced with a hate crime charge. Defense attorneys have long complained that prosecutors over-charge such cases in deference to their colleagues in police departments. There is often pressure to use every possible charge against someone who is accused of assaulting an officer. There is a danger that free speech rights could be implicated in such prosecutions as well as other protections.
While there will be powerful political pressures for Congress to yield to this demand, it is worth considering such questions before taking such step. First and foremost is the question of whether such a change is really needed in light of existing laws. There may be good arguments for the inclusion to be made but I hope that there is not a rush to take action due to our collective anger over these horrific attacks on police officers. This is a question that raises some novel questions about how such crimes are defined and proven.
What do you think?
Source: Yahoo
Domestic terrorism is in the act not the “thought”.
The act is still murder. Define terror…as opposed to a random killing by a junkie robbing somebody… without taking thought into account. Take all the time you need.
Explain why one should be treated differently than the other if we cannot account for personal motives.
Fo that matter, explain why negligent homicide should be any different from 1st degree murder if we cannot take personal thoughts (AKA motives) into official notice.
“Hate crimes laws exist because of the terror effect that thse crimes have on a specific population.”
How do you measure “terror” to determine when a certain group wants to be added to the list?
Do we tell the parents whose children were killed by a drunk running their bus off the road that their terror doesn’t qualify as a hate crime? Instead of going to radical extremist meetings the drunk went to a bar, got behind the wheel and killed the children. I’m sure the parents will feel better knowing the drunk didn’t hate them.
Go to Anytown, USA and commit a crime; every victim will ‘feel’ a degree of ‘terror’. I had my briefcase stolen out of my vehicle (in the garage) while I carried groceries into the house. This was an ungated HOA and it had a terror effect on the specific community; hate crime?
Ooops complete my thought. Is there latitude in punishment ….yes. At the time of sentencing and not based on a predetermined criteria of “hate”
I also am against mandatory sentencing of any kind and against the 3 strike mandatory sentencing laws.
So you have no problem repealing federal terrorism laws, as well as treating all homicides, accidental, pre-meditated and everthing in between…exactly the same.
Those are different things federal terrorism. You are already creating a false premise in that homicides, accidental and etc are currently not treated the same and there would be no change if you deleted the extra special super duper addition of “hate crime”.. Federal terrorism laws should be kept are those enacted to protect the citizens of the United States as an entire group of people against acts of war perpetrated via transcending international boundaries, financed by or perpetrated via international means. http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/part-I/chapter-113B.
Domestic terrorism is in the act not the “thought”.
Yes. All homicides and other crimes should be treated exactly the same as crimes being committed. Is there latitude in determining the motive. Yes. On a CASE BY CASE basis based on the facts and not automatically at the “classification” of the victim. Is there latitude in the punishment based on the heinousness of the crime or the motiviation
I can think all kinds of unsavory things about anyone that I want. Until I ACT on those thoughts there is no crime. And even IF I were to act on my motivation and and kill the neighbor that I hate (for whatever reason)….there is not necessarily any extra special super duper hate that I might have as to his/her sexual orientation or ethnic make up or whatever. Maybe I just hate my neighbor for no special reason. Maybe I hate his little yapping dog too and it has nothing to do with his lifestyle or looks. All of that would be determined in a trial and until then my neighbor is just as dead.
I believe in being treated fairly by others, regardless of what country I may live in or what it supposedly may stand for. The reality is that people are not equal, physically, or mentally, and they are not treated equally, in this country or any other place on earth. People who lie, cheat, and steal are morally inferior, even if they are righteous religious believers. It’s the behavior that counts, not the thoughts or the opinions, whether expressed publicly or otherwise.
Standing in your own front yard screaming anything shouldn’t be a crime unless you are disrupting your neighbors, the same as playing loud music there. Saying something that is socially offensive, whether to some or to many, shouldn’t be a crime. It may be a reason for the authorities to watch you closer, but by itself should not be grounds for detention, even if you are holding a gun at the time.
Amazing.
We really need an auto correct function here. Meh.
Standing in your own front yard screaming anything shouldn’t be a crime unless you are disrupting your neighbors, the same as playing loud music there. Saying something that is socially offensive, whether to some or to many, shouldn’t be a crime. It may be a reason for the authorities to watch you closer, but by itself should not be grounds for detention, even if you are holding a gun at the time.
I’m not some big city fancy lawyer, but I think that’s a crime regardless of who you yell must die.
I have loaded and shot a variety of rifles many time and in several different states.
Again:
Taken individually, each action may be perfectly legal. I can load the magazine to a rifle. I can insert the magazine into the magazine well and get a nice metallic click!. Still perfectly good (at least on my property, in my domicile or at a legal shooting venue)
When I start yelling about killing people, that demonstrates thoughts which indicate I am about to engage in serious mayhem, and somebody needs to step in immediatly, no matter how concerned some folks here about their precious thought crime persecution complex.
I am free to form my own classifications of what makes people good or bad, based upon their behaviors toward others, and I don’t believe all people are equal.
That explains much. You understand you are living in the wrong country, I take it? We were founded on that whole equality thing you seem to dislike. I have read plenty of primary documentation to that effect.
Also:
IANAL=I am not a lawyer (I have degrees in geology and history)
YMMV=your mileage may vary…meaning your experiences may differ based on your location and other factors.
Both of these are common abeviations, particularly on legal blogs.
Do you think that:
1. Loading 30 rounds of 7.62 Russian short into a Kalshikov magazine
2. Inserting said magazine into the reciving well of am Egyptian manufactured AKM rifle…
3 Screaming “THE JEWS MUST DIE!!!!”
is not cause for detaining the aforementioned person?????
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I’m not some big city fancy lawyer, but I think that’s a crime regardless of who you yell must die.
Inga,
I agree.
The fact that people want to punish “thought crimes” is frightening. Who gets to define what the “thoughts” are that are more criminal than others?
My God, you are too precius for words. Are you going to argue that thoughts are not intent and that intent cannot be demonstrated?
Do you think that:
1. Loading 30 rounds of 7.62 Russian short into a Kalshikov magazine
2. Inserting said magazine into the reciving well of am Egyptian manufactured AKM rifle…
3 Screaming “THE JEWS MUST DIE!!!!”
is not cause for detaining the aforementioned person?????
Every action taken discretely is perfectly legal in many, if not most jurisdictions.
I can load a kalashnikov magazine here in NC. I can load an AKM, AK-47 or SKS rifle (modified appropriately) with the magazine.
I can even yell that Jews should die (which is a vile position to hold)
Doing all of the above on my front lawn will get the police here in short order, and rightfully so.
My magic thought crimes(!!) are revealed as possible impending murder and my utterance will absolutely be used gainst me in a court of law when the police tell the judge why I am in handcuffs.
Bailers, ‘less than’ or ‘more than’. I find both problematic.
“So you have no problem repealing federal terrorism laws, as well as treating all homicides, accidental, pre-meditated and everything in between…exactly the same.”
I don’t know how you read that in my statement saying that we shouldn’t be treating crimes against some people as worse than against others. There is a clear legal definition between pre-meditated and accidental, or between various degrees of criminality. None of which punish someone worse if they chose to victimize a person based on an arbitrary physical characteristic.
Inga,
It’s worse than determining less than – we’re now codifying “more than”. Orwell would be proud of his predictive skills.
“If a human does wrong, does that make that human forever ‘less than’?”
I know this will win me few friends, but isn’t this exactly what sexual predator laws do? It doesn’t discriminate between minor crimes and the longtime predator that deserves to be in jail not free on the street.
I hope someday things like registrations (scarlet letters) and hate crimes will be abolished by a more enlightened public.
But my general answer is: it doesn’t matter what the motive is. Dead is dead. Broken bodies in the hospital don’t heal any faster if we know the assailant beat the tar out of someone for being black, gay, white, or just because they felt like it.
So you have no problem repealing federal terrorism laws, as well as treating all homicides, accidental, pre-meditated and everthing in between…exactly the same.
Because that is what you are advocating whether you know it or not.
The medical results may be the same, but the legal culpablity is nothing of the sort. Later today, you may take you eye off the road for one fatal second as a little girl stumbles out into your path while you are driving.
Horrible to contemplate, but still possible for any of us while driving.
I’m also pretty sure that it isn’t anything at all the same as taking a MP-5 submachine gun out and shooting her. You seem to think it is.
The fact that their “thought crimes” actually formed the criminal motivation for the acts ABSOLUTELY SHOULD BE HELD AGAINST THEM.
The fact that people want to punish “thought crimes” is frightening. Who gets to define what the “thoughts” are that are more criminal than others? The potential for abuse under this system is Stalinesque.
As Bailers said. Dead is dead. However, if a jury wants to enforce a stiffer penalty on a case by case basis that is within their prerogative and within the law. Motive is already a consideration and a part of our legal system. It is applied on each case and not as a group.
To have a defined class of people who get special consideration if/when crimes are committed against them, because of their special class, goes completely against our system of impartial justice.
AnneMarie, I was thinking along the same lines as you. Who determines whose lives matter more than others? So easy to characterize other humans as ‘less than’. While there are certain crimes that make the perpetrators despicable, who are we to deem them less than another human? People make terrible mistakes and do awful things under the influence, or they are insane, some (not enough) are actually rehabilitated and go on to live a productive life. If we consider their lives less precious, does that mean it’s not wrong to torture them, to starve them, etc. etc. should there be no standards for cruelty in prisons? If a human does wrong, does that make that human forever ‘less than’? Who gave us the right to be judge, jury and executioner?
AnneMarie,
I apologize, I’m not sure if you are serious or sarcastic.
But my general answer is: it doesn’t matter what the motive is. Dead is dead. Broken bodies in the hospital don’t heal any faster if we know the assailant beat the tar out of someone for being black, gay, white, or just because they felt like it. Hate crime laws and the special protections they bring need to go away.