What is the most common type of hate crime?
Asked by: Rebeka Mills MD | Last update: February 8, 2026Score: 4.3/5 (53 votes)
The most common hate crimes in the U.S. are motivated by race, ethnicity, or ancestry, with anti-Black bias being the most prevalent within that category, followed by crimes based on religion (especially anti-Jewish bias) and sexual orientation (targeting gay men), while the most frequent types of offenses reported are destruction/damage/vandalism, intimidation, and simple assault.
What is the number one hate crime in America?
Crimes against individuals account for 79% of all hate crime offenses. Intimidation (38.4%), destruction/damage/vandalism of property (29.4%) and simple assault (26.0%) were the top three. Note: There were 11,679 recorded hate crimes in 2024.
What is the #1 race for hate crimes?
Black or African American individuals are the most frequent victims of race-based hate crimes, consistently representing the largest single group targeted by offenders motivated by racial bias, followed by anti-White and anti-Hispanic/Latino biases, according to FBI data. While these statistics highlight racial bias as the top motivation for hate crimes, anti-Jewish incidents dominate religious hate crimes, and sexual orientation remains a significant driver for other bias-motivated offenses, with specific trends changing yearly.
What are the three main types of hate crime?
Types of hate crime
Hate crime can fall into one of three main types: physical assault, verbal abuse and incitement to hatred.
What type of crime is a hate crime?
Most state hate crime laws include crimes committed on the basis of race, color, and religion; many also include crimes committed on the basis of sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, and disability.
10 Important Facts about Hate Crimes
Can I sue for a hate crime?
Yes, you can sue someone for a hate crime in civil court to seek compensation for damages, even if criminal charges are also filed; civil lawsuits allow victims to recover costs, pain, suffering, and potentially punitive damages, holding offenders financially accountable beyond criminal penalties, and many states provide specific legal avenues for this.
What are the strands of hate crime?
Any crime can be prosecuted as a hate crime if the offender has either: demonstrated hostility based on race, religion, disability, sexual orientation or transgender identity.
What are the 4 types of hate?
While there isn't one universal list, a prominent psychological model identifies four types of hate: Normative (replaceable target, definite focus), Ideological (replaceable target, indefinite focus), Retributive (irreplaceable target, definite focus), and Malicious (irreplaceable target, indefinite focus), based on the target's replaceability and focus determinacy, says Springer Nature and APA PsycNet. Other perspectives categorize hate by manifestation (e.g., interpersonal, societal, structural) or underlying emotions (fear, greed, insecurity, competitiveness).
What are the top 10 most common crimes?
The top 10 most common crimes in the U.S. are led by property crimes like larceny-theft, burglary, and motor vehicle theft, followed by violent offenses such as aggravated assault and robbery, with other frequent offenses including drug offenses, DUI/DWI, fraud, vandalism/criminal damage, and domestic violence, with property crimes vastly outnumbering violent ones.
Is calling someone a slur a hate crime?
But such slurs, insults or hateful statements alone are not hate crimes. Free speech is protected by the First Amendment of the United States Constitution, even when it may contain hateful or inflammatory ideas.
What is the typical victim of hate crime?
Race and ethnicity are the most frequently cited reasons for why people thought they had been a victim of a hate crime, with black and Asian respondents being especially prevalent.
Why is a hate crime worse?
Impact on the individual victim. psychological and affective disturbances; repercussions on the victim's identity and self-esteem; both reinforced by a specific hate crime's degree of violence, which is usually stronger than that of a common crime.
What motivates most hate crimes?
But other factors involving the psychology of the offender have also been the subject of research. In one study widely used by law enforcement, sociologists Jack McDevitt and Jack Levin classified hate offenders as having four main motivations: thrill-seeking, defensive, retaliatory and mission.
What state commits the most hate crimes?
hate crime offenses were reported in California, the most out of any state. New Jersey, New York, Massachusetts, and Texas rounded out the top five states for hate crime offenses that year.
Which state is no. 1 in crime?
Alaska often ranks #1 for violent crime rates per capita, followed closely by New Mexico, while Louisiana frequently tops lists for overall danger or homicide rates, though figures vary slightly by source and specific metrics (violent vs. property crime) for 2024/2025 data.
What is the #1 crime city in the US?
Based on recent 2024 data from the FBI and other sources, Memphis, Tennessee, consistently ranks as having the highest violent crime rate per capita among large U.S. cities, followed by cities like Detroit, St. Louis, and Baltimore, though rankings can vary slightly by source and specific crime metrics (violent vs. property). These rankings are typically calculated per 100,000 residents, with Memphis reporting around 2,500 violent crimes per 100,000 people.
Which state is #1 in crime?
Alaska often ranks #1 for violent crime rates per capita, followed closely by New Mexico, while Louisiana frequently tops lists for overall danger or homicide rates, though figures vary slightly by source and specific metrics (violent vs. property crime) for 2024/2025 data.
What is the best true crime?
The "best" true crime is subjective, but popular and critically acclaimed choices include documentaries like Making a Murderer, The Staircase, The Jinx, and I'll Be Gone in the Dark, covering wrongful convictions, serial killers, and complex investigations. For disturbing cases, Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey, The Girl in the Picture, and American Murder: The Family Next Door are frequently recommended, while books like Framed by John Grisham offer gripping reads.
What are the 8 focus crimes?
"8 focus crimes" typically refers to the Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program's Part I offenses in the U.S. (murder, rape, robbery, assault, burglary, theft, vehicle theft, arson) or, in the Philippines, the Philippine National Police (PNP) list (murder, homicide, physical injury, rape, robbery, theft, carnapping of vehicles/motorcycles). These lists cover serious, frequent crimes that law enforcement tracks closely, though the specific categories differ slightly between systems.
What's higher than hate?
Abhor is from Latin abhorrere — "to shrink back in horror." It is the strongest way in English to express hatred, even stronger than loathe.
What is a type of hate crime?
Hate crime can fall into one of four main types: physical assault, verbal abuse, incitement to hatred and criminal damage.
Is hate a mental illness?
The APA feels that either hatred of those who are different are not mental illnesses or they can be categorized as other mental illnesses such as depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder or intermittent explosive disorder. Extreme hatred does cause extreme crime.
How hard is it to prove a hate crime?
"You need to prove not just the incident, but the state of mind of the defendant -- that what they intended was hate-motivated," Wagner said. "That's never easy and often involves not just looking at the incident, but going back and investigating the background of the defendant."
What is a victim of a hate crime?
Hate crime is defined as a crime against someone based on a part of their identity. There are five categories of 'identity' when a person is targeted because of a hostility or prejudice towards their: disability. race or ethnicity.
Why is it called a hate crime?
Admittedly, the name is a little misleading since most violent crimes are committed in anger. However, it's a short and simple way to get the message across that a crime was committed due to hatred of an entire race or other protected class.