Category: Criminal Behavior

The Prerequisites Of Hate Crimes

Throughout U.S history, hate crimes have been known as a crime that someone is motivated to commit based on their bias. For instance, some are based on a person’s race, gender, religion or ethnic background. Although the United States has passed laws to lower the numbers of crimes committed each year and to stop them, hate crimes is still an issue in the system today.

In the past, hate crimes emerged all over the world, not only in the United States during the late 1970’s, many crimes were motivated by race this was due to the fact that many African Americans were still being treated as second class citizens, and being discriminated against their society. It was not only African Americans who faced these problems, but many other races were having hate crimes perpetrated towards them. Therefore, the number of crimes committed by hatred were shown on a survey by the FBI, the number of hate crimes each year has increased since the attack on the twin towers. For instance, “in 2016 statistics by the FBI, 57.5 percent were motivated by race and ancestry bias, 21.0 percent were motivated by religious bias, and 17.7 by sexual orientation. The number of hate crimes based on race was the highest crime, at 57.5%, by 2018 race based crimes increased by 2.1% (“Hate Crime Statistics” 2019)”. Even though, hate crimes were committed before the 9/11, there was not much attention towards hate crimes until after that day, but the U.S. was not the only during this period dealing with these types of crimes in the system. In fact, Australia had passed a numerous amount of laws to stop people from committing violent crimes. The country banned anyone from inciting hatred toward a particular racial, ethnic and religious group, however they also relyed on existing discrimination laws (Jenness 2018).

As a result of hate crimes occurring in our country, the United States created punishment under criminal laws hoping it would reduce the number of crimes throughout the nation. “Criminal law, regulates the apprehension, charging and trial of suspected persons, and fixes penalties and modes of treatment applicable to convicted offenders (Jescheck & Norton 2019)”. This caused many Americans to argue that hate crimes are different from other types of violent crimes, because they threaten the safety of a group of people. Not long after, the United States began passing laws and penalties for bias motivated crimes throughout the U.S. challenging the constitution. Moreover, they are a numerous number of laws meant to help prevent crimes being committed against a group of people. For example, the first law enacted by President Lyndon Johnson was, “The Violent Interference with Federally Protected Rights and Criminal Interference with Right to Fair Housing,” it a crime to use, or threatened to use force to interfere with housing rights because of the victim’s race, color, religion, sec or national origin. “Conspiracy Against Rights, 18 U.S.C. & 241, this law makes it unconstitutional for more than one person to conspire to injure, threaten or intimidate a person in any state (Hate Crime Laws)”. In addition to this law, there is “Violent Interference with Federally Protected Rights” this law enforces that threatening to force to willful interfere with a person’s participation in a federal protected activity due to a person’s race, color or religion. “Damage to Religious Property, Church Arson Prevention Act, prohibits the intentional defacement, damage, or destruction of religious property because of the religious nature of the property, where crimes are being committed because of race, color, and ethnic character of the people associated with the property (Hate Crime Laws)”. Following this law, is the “Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act” which was signed in 2009 by the United States former President Obama, it expanded hate crimes into violent crimes that were motivated by disability, gender, and sexual orientation (“Hate Crime Laws”). By extension, the act makes it a federal crime to injure anyone using a dangerous weapon, such as a gun, due to their race, color, or religion.

Even though, the United States Government has passed a variety of laws in order to stop the number of hate crimes from being committed against citizens of America. The number of hate crimes in America have increased in 2019 since 2018, for instance in “2018 there were four thousand and forty seven crimes committed based on Race/Ethnicity/Ancestry, one thousand four hundred and nineteen for religion, one thousand one hundred ninety six on sexual orientation and forty seven based on gender (Hate Crime Statistics)”. Some recent examples of hate crimes, October 17, 2018, a man in Texas burned down the Victoria Islamic Center he committed a hate crime based on the groups religious beliefs. Following this was a religious and national origin hate crime, on January 25, 2019 Curtis Allen, Gavin Wright, and Patrick Stein were arrested for conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction in order to violate the housing rights act. These men intended to blow up the apartment of a Somali Muslim immigrant who lived in that apartment. On January 29, 2019, in Pennsylvania Robert Bowers was charged with 44 federal courts, as he committed a hate crime based on one’s religion.

The shooting occurred on October 27, Bowers entered the Tree of Life Synagogue with a numerous amount of firepower, ultimately killing eleven worshippers, and injuring two other members of the congregations and five law enforcement officers. The next crime committed was on March 27, 2019 in Virginia, this crime was based on race, color and national origin of a person. James Alex Fields, participated in a white nationalist rally held in Charlotttesvill, James admitted that he drove into downtown where a racially and ethnically diverse crowd had gathered, and in addition to these actions he had expressed his opinon on social media about white supremacist views. On March 28, 2019 in Dallas a man plead guilty to kidnapping men because of their sexual orientation, Atkinson used social media to place gay men in areas where robbery, carjacking, and kidnapping were happening. He also withdrawed money form his victims accounts and witnessed the assualt of a victim who was called gay. Atkinson committed a variety of hate crimes all because of the sexual orientation men would identify as.

As seen above many of the crimes were committed based on race, sexual orientation, and religion however on October 31, 2019 a Louisiana family members were sentenced for violating the civil rights of women with disabilities. Terry Knope, Raylaine Knope, Bridget Knope, and Jody Lambert violated the federal housing rights of women with disabilities, and obtaining forced labor, the family displayed the crimes through force, threats of force, physical restraint, verbal and psychological abuse. These four human beings placed the victim in a backyard cage, forcing her to perform housework for food and water, while they kept the federal disability benefits for themselves. “The last recent case happened in Mississippi on November 7, 2019 when a man Graham Williamson and Louie Revette, these two people lit a fire near the homes of many African-American in the Key Hills (Hate Crime Case Examples)”. The actions of these men threatened many african american lives ultimately committing a crime based on their background and race color.

The Effects of Human Psychology on Crime Commitment

There is much that can be said eyewitness testimonies and their place in the use of solving crimes, and the psychology behind them. While they are often used to solve crimes, the truth is that the human memory is a very malleable, unreliable thing and that many psychological factors should be considered when considering the reliability of eyewitness testimonies. To examine this, first I will look at a case study where an unreliable eyewitness testimony led to the wrongful conviction of an innocent man.

In 1984, on one night, a man broke into a woman’s house and proceeded to sexually assault her. Her name was Jennifer Thompson, at the time, she was a 22 year old student. After this crime, police began an investigation. She then proceeded police to create a sketch of what the man looked like, as she had taken it upon herself to remember as many of his features as possible during the assault. Just hours after the assault, after she had been swabbed for any DNA samples left by the perpetrator, she helped police create this sketch. She picked out multiple features of him that she had remembered. For example, his eyebrows, his nose and the fact that he had a very thin moustache. Following a search, just a week later, the police rounded up multiple men who bared a resemblance to the man provided in the police sketch. After this, she was shown multiple photos of the men. Of all the men, she chose one man. While at first she selected him with a bit of apprehension, eventually her confidence grew more and more and with absolute certainty she confirmed that this was the man that had raped her that night. This man was known as Ronald Cotton, a 22 year old black male. He had previous encounters with law enforcement, in particular, he had previously served an 18 month sentence for attempted sexual assault, and following a search of his house, they determined he had been the perpetrator, tying him to the crime scene with a footprint and a flashlight that resembled the one used by the suspect, along with Thompson’s eyewitness testimony. In January 1985, Cotton was convicted of one count of rape and also with one count of burglary. Thompson finally felt that justice had been served, and that the right man was behind bars. During the trial and following incarceration, Cotton vehemently denied his involvement in the case and was adamant that he was an innocent man, wrongly convicted.

Unfortunately, this was not the case. During his time in prison, another inmate, Bobby Poole, had been bragging to prisoners that he was also guilty of committing the rape of Thompson. Not only this, but an hour after the rape of Thompson, in the same neighbourhood, another woman was raped in the same style as Thompson. Police were certain that the same man had committed both crimes. Managing to use his lawyer to call Poole to the stand, Cotton managed to bring an appeal before the court, once again defending his innocence. However, during the trial, Poole denied all these accusations when he was taken to the stand. And more importantly, the eye witness and key part of the trial. She looked at both Poole and Cotton. She then denied ever seeing Poole and reaffirming her view that Thompson was guilty. Then the victim of the second rape looked at both Poole and Thompson. Not only had the lost the appeal, he had been given a second life sentence for the second rape he had now been deemed to have committed.

It took 11 years for Cotton to finally reach a positive breakthrough. With the advent of new DNA technology, he was finally able to clear his name. The samples from Thompson were tested and showed no match to Cotton. He had finally been proven innocent. Not only this, but the DNA had finally confirmed that Poole was, indeed, guilty of these crimes.

But where had it all went wrong for Thompson? Police had described her as the perfect witness. However, it became very clear that Poole and Cotton only looked similar on a very superficial level. How could someone who have spent so long not only focusing on her attacker’s features but also attempt to commit it to memory make so many mistakes? There are multiple psychological factors at play here. It is important to examine every aspect of when this crime took place to understand the failings of the eyewitness testimony.

According to research, over 4250 Americans every year are thought to be wrongfully convicted of a crime due to a false identification by either the victim of the crime or a witness. The National Justice Institute of America even conducted a study and found that 80% of overturned wrongful convictions are because of eyewitness testimony.

According to a study by (Loftus 1974), eyewitnesses are almost always believed. In this study, Mock Jurors were presented with a court case where a suspect was believed to have committed a robbery and the murder of 2 people. When no eyewitness testimony was provided and only circumstantial evidence could be given, only 18% of the jury convicted the suspect. However, when provided with an eyewitness testimony and the evidence, this number shot up to 72%. Even when the jury is told that the eyewitness has very poor eyesight, this number only decreased by 4% down to 68%.

Studies not even show that eyewitness testimonies are believed, but they can even be believed more than things such as physical evidence (McAllister, Bregman 1986), alibis (McAllister, Bregman 1989).

Despite all this, testimonies are undeniably very unreliable due to the nature of human memory. As the crime becomes more violent and thus more stressful to the witnesses, they can become even more unreliable, and distort memory. Memory can be distorted in multiple ways. One form of this is misinformation. A person’s memory can be proven to be manipulated after being exposed to misleading information regarding that information. For example, a person who is shown a photo of what may be the perpetrator of a crime will tend to believe that person is responsible. This is because this photo will distract the original memory and distort it. This is not intentionally deceitful by the police; however, it can distort the memory all the same and muddy the truth. It is also possible to change what a person remembers or views a memory by the words used when phrasing questions. This is known as suggestion. For example, a group of students were shown the same footage of a car crashing. Students who were asked “how fast the cars were going when the cars smashed into each other” on average gave a speed of 20% faster than the students who were asked “how fast the cars were going when the cars hit each other?” This is due to the subtle wording used can trigger how the memory is viewed in the student’s head. The same effect was achieved during the study when asked a question regarding a car crash. The questions were the same, however, the students were then asked if they saw broken glass at the scene of the accident. Those who were asked the question with the word “smashed” over “hit” were also twice as more likely to report seeing the broken glass, when, there was no glass present. (Loftus 1974)

There are other ways memory can be manipulated or end up being distorted. For example, if an eyewitness is told that their selection in a line-up of possible suspects was correct, this would lead to them believing more that their selection was right than if the police did not inform them, even when this is not the case. This can also occur when negative feedback is given, and a person will start to doubt their own memories and second guess themselves. There is also an effect known as the weapon focus effect. When a weapon is present during a crime, this greatly reduces the accuracy of attempts to either identify the suspect or to even recall details of the crime. This is because the perceived threat of the weapon is greater than focusing on other details. It can also be attributed to increasing levels of stress and anxiety in the brain which can also interrupt the encoding of memory. This is because we generally expect weapons around us and thus when they appear, we must focus and ascertain their threat level to us. Our eyes will track the weapon, thus drawing attention away from the holder of the weapon.

There have also been numerous studies done that support the theory of cross-race identification. This is the theory that we have more trouble identifying features of people in a race different to our own. It has been proven by studies that cross-race identification will be consistently weaker than own-race identification. This is due to the fact that we are more able to discern features in faces similar to our own and our brain has a simpler time processing them, due to a closer genetic similarity. While the effect has been proven in a study of African and Caucasian faces by (Meissner, Brigham 2001), it also applies to other races, for example, Caucasian and Asian, etc.

Multiple studies have also shown that the illumination factor plays a major role in our recall of a memory. On top of that, longer exposure to something will also increase the accuracy of identification. According to a study by (Loftus et al, 1987), witnesses tend to overestimate the length they have viewed something by up to 60%. A study done by Yarmey (1986) investigated recall and identification during 4 different times of the day. These were during daylight, the beginning of twilight, the end of twilight, and night time itself. It was found that the presence of light has a major effect on recall and that the more there is a light source present, the more accurate the memory will be.

It is also found that if a suspect adds features that were not present during the crime, for example, glasses or a hat, a witness will have a much harder time positively identifying them. This also applies the opposite way, for example, if a suspect has a moustache during a crime and promptly shaves it, this will make it harder for a positive identification to be made. (Cutler et al., 1985)

As we saw in the Cotton case, confidence too can play a major role in memory recall. The more Thompson’s confidence grew that Cotton was her rapist, the more she truly believed it was him, even when this proved to not be the case. It is also important to note that the individual characteristics can have a big influence on the quality of the memory that is being recalled. For example, according to (O’Rourke et al., 1989) and (Valentine et al., 2003), young adults tend to make the most reliable eyewitnesses, superior to both young children and older adults. It has been shown that elderly witnesses are more likely to possess worse memory than their younger counterparts in a study by (Aizpurua et al., 2009) Substance use, such as the consumption of drugs and alcohol, can have a major negative impact. Not only can such substances negatively impact vision, they also increase the likelihood of choosing in a lineup of potential suspects. These of course, when combined, can lead to people being wrongfully identified.

When we look at the Cotton case, we can see that there were a lot of these factors at play. The rape occurred in low illumination, which affected Thompson’s vision. Poole had also held a knife to her throat when committing the act, causing the weapon focus effect to also take place. On top of this, the act itself of being sexually assaulted can have a major negative impact on one’s ability to encode information probably due to the high stress levels caused by such a horrific ideal. There is also the presence of a need for justice in Thompson’s mind, which caused her to subconsciously suggest to herself that Cotton must have been the man to have committed the crime. There is also of course, the cross-race effect. Cotton and Poole are both men of African descent while Thompson is a Caucasian woman. While Poole and Cotton are only similar on a superficial level, Thompson could not discern this even after seeing both men. There is also the possibility that, unintentionally, the police may have guided her towards selecting Cotton as the man who committed the crimes when conducting the lineup and the photograph viewing.

Overall, I think that due to the abundance of statistics and psychological research present, it is quite clear that eyewitness testimonies are quite fallible and over-relied on by the courts. On top of this, memory is not something so simple that it can be broken down and applied the same way in each case. There are many influential factors that play a part in the recall of an event, from the characteristics of the witness, to the characteristics of the perpetrator and the details of the event itself, such as the level of light or the presence of a weapon. In my opinion, there should be great care taken in the use of witnesses both by the judiciary and the law enforcement. A great deal of power is placed into the hands of these testimonies, yet they so often result in innocent people being convicted. I believe that every step in the use of eyewitness testimonies should be rigorously analysed and that there should be a guideline created. This guideline would teach law enforcement, such as the sketchers and the detectives, how to avoid interfering with the recall process of the witness, either by priming, suggesting. Given how easy it is to manipulate a person’s memory, a great deal of care is needed in how this process is conducted, in order to ensure that more innocent people like Ronald Cotton lose valuable years of their life for an action they didn’t commit.

Bibliography

1. Fawcett, M, J., Pearce, A, K., Greve, A. (2016) ‘Looking Down the Barrel of a Gun: What Do We Know About the Weapon Focus Effect?’ Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition, Volume 5(3), 257-263, available: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jarmac.2016.07.005
2. Franklin, N. (n.d.) A Brief Guide to Factors that Commonly Influence Identification and Memory For Criminal Events, Dept. Of Psychology, Stony Brook University. Available: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.471.475&rep=rep1&type=pdf [accessed 29 Nov 19]
3. National Research Council. (2014) Identifying the Culprit: Assessing Eyewitness Identification. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press
4. Lacy, J. W., Stark, C. (2013) The Neuroscience of Memory: Implications for the Courtroom. Nature Reviews. Neuroscience, 14(9) 649-658, available: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4183265/

Human Behavior Recognition in Surveillance Systems

Abstract

This paper is a literature review that focuses on detecting and analyzing the human behavior and its application in surveillance systems. Surveillance systems play a very important role in tracking and monitoring human behavior generally, this is one of the reasons why it has recently become a major interesting research topic. Human effort is not very effective in monitoring human behavior via surveillance systems as human operators miss a lot of information in different video frames.

Sometimes, it is difficult to differentiate a normal behavior from an abnormal behavior as what is normal in a context may be abnormal in another context. Ordinary surveillance systems on their own cannot classify human behavior into normal or abnormal behavior and for this reason, they require machine learning techniques. With machine learning techniques, surveillance systems can detect different objects, find anomalies in the monitor screen automatically and alert the necessary authority.

We aim in this paper to write a literature review article aimed to provide a foundation of knowledge on human behavior recognition and establish similarities and differences between previous studies by analyzing major formative work in the field of surveillance systems.

Introduction

Human action detection, motion tracking, scene modelling, and behavior understanding (human activity recognition and discovery of activity patterns) have received a lot of attention in the computer vision and machine learning communities (Popoola & Wang, 2012) due to the uprising of several fields that these tools can be implemented efficiently in.

Researchers have developed a large interest in the areas of computer vision and machine learning communities to analyze the problem of human behavior in video clips. This is because in the last decade, systems used to consist of a low-level/mid-level computer vision system (to detect and analyze moving objects such as humans or cars) and a higher level interpretation module (to categorize motion into behaviors, for example, a pointing gesture or a car turning right). However, there have been few efforts to understand human behaviors that have vast extent in time, particularly when they involve serious interactions between people (Oliver, Rosario, & Pentland, 2000). Therefore, our main goal of this paper is to focus on detecting and analyzing the human behavior and its application in surveillance systems.

Video surveillance systems have become more important in today’s life, especially with the developments of computer science, communication technology, and internet engineering. Governments install video surveillance systems that work 24/7 in major government buildings and important facilities (e.g. airports, borders, roads) to fight against crime and keep an eye on places where incidents such as theft and accidents are likely to occur (Mishra & Saroha, 2016). The increasing need of security and safety in different areas has pushed video surveillance systems to emerge from the first generation “dumb camera” surveillance that needs a human eye to evaluate its images to the second generation “computer‐linked camera” surveillance systems that evaluate its own video images and reduce the human factor in surveillance (Surette, 2005). It is difficult to monitor simultaneous events in surveillance displays due to many limitations, therefore efforts are being made to design intelligent surveillance systems that are capable of distinguishing between what is a normal or an abnormal behavior within the context, because a normal behavior in one context may be abnormal in another (Kale, Jawale, Dhende, Abak, & Kosht, 2019).

Intelligent surveillance systems can detect different objects and find anomalies in the monitor screen automatically. As a result, it provides security personnel with the quickest and best way to alert and provide useful information (Zhao et al., 2014). These intelligent surveillance systems use various machine learning techniques and methods in order to understand human actions/behaviors. However, understanding of human actions using machine learning is a complex, diverse, and challenging area that has received much attention within the past ten years. Applications have included video surveillance and human–computer interfaces (Popoola & Wang, 2012) in addition to many more. Previous surveys and the number of conferences, papers, and good surveys on detecting or tracking human motion and gestures as well as anomaly detection and behavior recognition or analysis show that it is a highly researched area.

Video surveillance generally involves acquiring and processing visual data from a scene, in order to detect target(s) along time and space so as to recognition suspicious behaviors in awkward situations and if possible, generate alarms. It begins with change detection and motion data capture for moving targets (using tracking or non-tracking methods), to enable successive high-level event analysis (Popoola & Wang, 2012).

As a result, we aim in this paper to write a literature review article aimed to provide a foundation of knowledge on human behavior recognition and establish similarities and differences between previous studies by analyzing major formative work in the field of surveillance systems in order to draw a conclusion on the best practices of recognizing human behavior in surveillance systems and the best machine learning method used.

Literature Review

The applications of security surveillance in content based video retrieval and annotation, human computer interaction, human fall detection, video summarization, robotics, etc., has made human behavior recognition an important area of research in computer vision. Video surveillance systems are employed in the monitoring and analyzing of human behavior and activities. The main aim of intelligent surveillance system is to detect suspicious human or object behavior (otherwise known as abnormal behavior) in certain scenes and provide real time notification to the relevant person (Kale, Jawale, Dhende, Abak, & Kosht, 2019). J (2015) defines an abnormal behavior to be one that deviates from usual known behavior. (Kale and Patil, 2016), states that human behavior recognition “is a systematic approach to understand and analyze the movement of people in a camera captured content”.

The analysis of human behavior with the use of surveillance systems involves a pre-processing phase that detects the foreground and the background, tracking, feature extraction and then a machine learning method for classifying behavior into normal behavior or abnormal behavior (Farzad & Asli, 2015). Machine learning, as a branch of artificial intelligence, enables machines to perform given tasks skillfully with intelligent software (Mohammed, Khan, & Bashier, 2016).

Supervised learning: Supervised learning is basically concerned with labeled data. Hence, it is easy to apply its algorithms to pattern classification and data regression problems. It is used to discover mapping rules for predicting outputs of unknown inputs (Wang & Sng, 2015).

Unsupervised learning: Unlike supervised learning, unsupervised learning is concerned with unlabeled data. Unsupervised learning can be used to handle intra-class variation as it does not require labels of data. This learning algorithm deals with a form of network learning that gives correct response without any interference of an external behavior (Mishra & Saroha, 2016).

Semi-supervised Learning: Semi-supervised learning is a combination of both supervised learning and unsupervised learning. (He & He, 2018) proposed an end-to-end Unsupervised Multi-Object Detection framework for video surveillance, where a neural model learns to detect objects from each video frame by minimizing the image reconstruction error.

Clustering Algorithms: Clustering refers to the process of data gathering with identical features into groups. These groups are otherwise known as clusters (Al-Dhamari, Sudirman, & Mahmood, 2017). Abnormal detection with the aid of clusters is made possible using a clustering algorithm to analyze and then classify the data. (Lei, Jiang, Wu, & Du, 2016) further classified clustering algorithms into hierarchical clustering, partitioning clustering, model-based clustering, density-based clustering, grid-based clustering, etc.

Classification: A classification technique is used to manage or group of different objects individually. Object classification detect object and provide information that is needed for video analytics. It gives more detailed description of events or behaviors of objects. Object classification is useful for detection accuracy and creates high level metadata that describes another data in the video sequence (Mishra & Saroha, 2016).

Candamo, Shreve, Goldgof, Sapper, and Kasturi (2010) presented a survey research on human behavior recognition algorithms for surveillance in transit scenes with image processing techniques. The methods of detection Candamo et al. (2010) researched includes slow movement (individual), fighting (for multiple person) individual-vehicle recognition and object recognition. It was stated in their research that algorithms for human behavior recognition can aid in averting certain occurrences.

Popoola and Wang (2012) in their review on video based abnormal behavior recognition pointed out some methods of detecting abnormal human behvior using machine learning techniques.

Methodology

Selecting Research Papers

In this paper, we review research works in the area of detecting and analyzing human behavior together with its application in surveillance systems for a period of nineteen years (19) years, i.e., only research work done between 2000 and 2019 were selected. Information gathered was done by studying the abstract of different research works including journals, conferences materials, academic articles and surveys that have to do with – “human behavior”, “intelligent surveillance systems”, “abnormal behavior detection”, “machine learning in surveillance systems” and then extracting necessary information for our research purpose. Forty (40) research works were reviewed and are all documented in English language including journals from IEEE, Engineering and Technology International Journal of Computer and Information Engineering, Journal of Engineering and Applied Sciences, etc.

Result

Abnormal behaviors can sometimes be difficult to detect in video surveillance by a human observer (Sultani, Chen, & Shah, 2018), since there are no clear distinctions of abnormal behaviors from normal behaviors in certain circumstances especially in emergency situations like traffic accidents, crimes and terrorist attacks (Shao, Cai, & Wang, 2018). In other words, the abnormal behavior to be detected is determined by the defined normal behavior (Eisa & Moreira, 2017). Walking, running or sitting down are common normal behaviors that we exhibit as humans in our daily life (Chaaraoui, Padilla-Lopez, Ferrandez-Pastor, Nieto-Hidalgo, & Florez-Revuelta, 2014). However, abnormal behaviors may include abandoned object detection, suspicious human behavior, and intruder detection (Kotkar & Sucharita, 2017).

Dimensions of Abnormal Human Behavior

We can classify abnormal human behavior recognition into two dimensions – individual abnormal behavior recognition and crowd abnormal behavior recognition (Dhiman & Vishwakarma, 2018).

• Individual Abnormal Behavior Recognition: In most cases, according to Dhiman & Vishwakarma (2018), the individual abnormal human behavior recognition is used in Ambient Assisted Living (AAL). ALL is a group of concepts, services, and products that combine new technologies with social environment in order to create better life quality specially for older people by using, for example, wearable sensors and health-monitoring devices that transmit data such as blood pressure to a person’s health care facility (e.g. hospital), updating the person’s medical records and providing early alerts to changes in health status. These surveillance systems are able to detect abnormal behavior in terms of health problems (Eisa & Moreira, 2017) for old people or health deterioration and life-threatening situations (Paula Lago & Roncancio, 2017). They are usually used in smart homes where wearable sensors or non-wearable sensors are employed. The wearable sensors fixed on the individual’s clothes or body and the non-wearable sensors are position in certain parts of the house (Debes, et al., 2016).

Meng, Miao, and Leung (2017) presented an Online Daily Habit Modeling and Anomaly Detection (ODHMAD) model with a list of defined activities to be detected and their various sensors. It provides online analysis of old person’s sensory behavior data for daily behavior detection.

• Crowd Abnormal Behavior Recognition: The presence of intelligent surveillance systems in the public is important for the safety of the general public (Zhao, Zhou, & Wei, 2012). It is difficult to detect abnormal behavior in a crowded environment due to the complexity of the image. The detection of abnormal crowd behavior depends solely on the motion characteristics, interactions, and spatial distribution of a crowd (Marsden, McGuinness, Little, & O’Connor, 2016).

How it Works: Detecting Abnormal Behaviors

In order to detect behaviors (normal and abnormal), visual data need to be obtained from the surveillance system for the main purpose of recognizing suspicious behaviors and alert the authority (J, 2015). It starts by tracking targets (with the use of either tracking or non-tracking methods) when there is a change in motion for analysis. Detecting abnormal behavior involves the search of unexpected problem in a data pattern (Kotkar & Sucharita, 2017).

According to Al-Dhamari et al. (2017), sensors are major components for surveillance systems. They aid in sighting targets that exhibit abnormal behaviors. Visible Light Camera (VLC), Thermal Camera (TC), Forward Looking Infrared (FLIR) camera are examples of sensors used in surveillance.

Feature extraction is done to detect area of interest of human movement (Xu et al., 2018), after which the ectracted features are then trained or tested with model and finally classified into normal or abnormal behavior.

Machine Learning Techniques

Some machine learning techniques that can be used to detect and classify abnormal human behaviors include:

• Support vector machine (Xu, Li, Fang, & Zhang, 2018) – Balasubramanian, Archana, Elangovan, and Abhaikumar (2010) proposed a system to detect abnormal behaviors by extracting skeleton features and inputting them into support vector machine to process and then classify the behaviors into normal or abnormal behaviors.
• Fuzzy clustering technique (Chen, Tian, Zeng, & Huang, Detecting Abnormal Behaviors in Surveillance Videos Based on Fuzzy Clustering and Multiple Auto-Encoders, 2015): From figure 3.3 below, Chen et al. ( 2015), presented a framework consisting of fuzzy clustering to distribute some trajectories and Auto-Encoders to classify behaviors.

The Auto-Encoder acquires similar structures of normal video sequences and does estimation of normal patterns.

• Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) – Tay, Connie, Ong, Goh, and Teh (2019) in their work presented a CNN-based method to detect abnormal behavior. The CNN learns the characteristics of different abnormal behaviors on its own and analyses the abnormal behavior of an individual, more than one individual and even crowds.
• Kang, Shin, and Shin (2010) proposed the use of Hierarchical Markov Model to identify human behavior states and an algorithm based on data acquired from state-change sensors to identify abnormal behavior in a smart home. There is an improved detection accuracy with this model as it was used to predict human behavior while cooking a meal.
• Recurrent Neural Networks (RNN) – Arifoglu and Bouchacia (2017) proposed a method for detecting anomaly in old people with dementia (a disease in which a person experiences a decline in mental ability) using recurrent neural networks. In their proposed method, they extract sensor based features after a dataset has been segmented into frames and the RRN used to recognize already trained activities and encode behavioral patterns.
• Deep convolutional framework – Ko and Sim (2018) in their research proposed a unified framework which is based on deep convolutional framework to detect anomaly in images with RGB color scheme. The aim of the unified framework was to enhance recognition speed.

Applications of Surveillance Systems

Video surveillance systems have wide range of applications like traffic monitoring and human activity understanding (Harish, Swati, Sonali, & Sangmesh, 2015), hospital for monitoring patient, in industry and process plant to monitor the activity of the production line (Jadhav, Suryawanshi, & Jadhav, 2017). Rai, Husain, Maity, & Yadav (2018), says that governments generally use surveillance systems during investigations and for the protection the masses.

• Traffic Monitoring: Surveillance systems are found on very busy roads and junctures in major highways (Rai et al., 2018) mostly to monitor pedestrians (Kotkar & Sucharita, 2017), track vehicles, estimate vehicle speed and monitor highway activities. Video clips are collected from the surveillance and processed frame by frame with image processing algorithms. Results obtained from the detection and tracking results are used for vehicle counts and vehicle speed estimation (Park, Kim, Lee, Park, & Suh, 2017).
• Crime Prevention: Surveillance systems have been positioned majorly in urban regions to eliminate crime and reduce insecurity in the areas. Data obtained from the surveillance systems in the form of recorded voice and video clips are used as evidence and also to investigate committed crimes (Shao, Cai, & Wang, 2018). They are very useful in crime prevention and forensic.
• Hospitals: Surveillance systems are required to monitor psychiatric patients (Hsu, Chuang, Huang, Teng, & Lin, 2018), mange issues that include the abduction of infants (Dasic, Dasic, & Crvenkovic, 2017), detect disorders and diseases (Candas, et al., 2014).
• Industry: In industries, surveillance systems can be used to predict human error.

Drawbacks of the Video Surveillance in Abnormality Detection

• For crowd analysis Lv, Liu, Xu, & Zhou (2018) reports that there is difficulty in identifying new movements which results in emergencies.
• Surveillance systems can be complex sometimes. They do not inter-link local patterns (Bouindour, Snoussi, Mohamad, Tazi, & Wang, 2019).
• Occlusion problem: This refers to inter-object interference mostly in crowded scene(s). It produces poor quality of already available surveillance video clips (Charara, Jarkass, Sokhn, Mugellini, & Khaled, 2012).
• It is difficult to abstract vigorous descriptors and classify algorithms, which results in false alarms (Bouindour, Snoussi, Mohamad, Tazi, & Wang, 2019).
• The cost of storage of surveillance systems largely increases because video data increases in size (Shao, Cai, & Wang, 2018).

Conclusion

In this paper, we did a literature review on the existing knowledge of human behavior recognition and its applications in the field of surveillance systems. We introduced the most significant machine learning techniques and methods used in detecting and classifying abnormal human behaviors.

Obviously, based on our study in the previous sections, we can see that human behavior detection algorithms face several challenges such as:

• Labeled data for training and validation of models, employed by abnormal detection technique (e.g. the support vector machine technique), is not always available which causes a significant issue.
• The meaning of abnormality differs from an application to another. Also, applying the same technique into different fields is not always possible.
• Video clips that have complex scenes take more time to process while extracting features and abnormal events.

Having these challenges and many more shows that solving the abnormal behavior detection issue is not straightforward. Using a certain method in one environment/application does not mean that it will work well in other applications. Therefore, there is a need to always examine the performance of machine learning abnormal detection methods in order to improve its work within the wanted context.

Applying these methods in surveillance systems was also among the topics that we discussed throughout our paper. We firstly introduced surveillance systems first generations (dumb camera) that needs a human eye to evaluate its images. Then, we focus on the second generation “intelligent surveillance systems” that are capable of distinguishing between what is a normal or an abnormal behavior and can detect different objects automatically. As we mentioned in previous sections, the detection of abnormal behaviors using surveillance systems is used in several applications such as traffic monitoring and preventing crimes. Data obtained from intelligent surveillance systems experience pre-processing phase that detects the foreground and the background, feature extraction, and then one of the mentioned machine learning method is applied for classifying behaviors.

At the end, it is of note that more work should be devoted in order to build up real-time intelligence surveillance frameworks that can particularly overcome the scalability of video analysis especially in the real videos that contain a lot of moving objects, activities, and a crowd.

What’s Happening With Rape Culture?

If you got asked about rape culture would you say it’s just delusional feminists that have made it up or a serious topic that needs to be spoken about? Rape culture is a way of people normalising rape due to different reasons such as gender, sexuality and more. This topic has become quite the debate, especially on social media mainly after the #metoo movement which was started on twitter it was designed for sexual assault victims to speak out about their experiences and the way they were treated.

There have been multiple court cases where the assault victims underwear has been held up as evidence as a reason for the victim to have been raped or sexually assaulted. There was a case that blew up on the news recently about the female that was raped and her lace front thong was held up in front of a jury to prove that she was wanting it. Soon after that article was written another old case started being spoken about more often because the girl that’s underwear was shown at court had committed suicide due to embarrassment. “The mother of a girl who killed herself after being forced to hold up her underwear in court has added her voice to a campaign against victim blaming.” This was a heading for the newspaper the metro the rest of the article goes on to explain how there’s still far too much victim blaming going on and not enough rapist blaming.

Those that don’t believe that rape culture either exists or is a big deal believe the span is too broad as too what is classed as rape for example the Irish Times had an article called “Flawed notion of ‘rape culture’ is lacking in logic” apart of this article there is a part explaining how they feel too much is classed as rape by comparing it to murder “‘Rape culture’, as a philosophical construct, simply doesn’t make sense. The span is too broad to be useful. Would we talk about ‘murder culture’, with nipping or pinching at one end of the scale, and homicide at the other end?”

There have been many different campaigns for when it comes to rape like the #metoo movement but there has also been the #thisisnotconsent movement where females go out to different places in their underwear to show that no matter what they are wearing they still didn’t say yes. The females walk through mostly the town in whatever it is they’re wearing with the words “this is not consent” written on different parts of their body. The “still not asking for it campaign” is where females, males and even some children stand for pictures topless or in vests the topless women cover up with tape they stand or sit with signs saying “still not asking for it” to show that no matter how someone looks or is dressed or even their gender and age does not mean they are asking to be assaulted or raped. The #RedMyLips campaign is aimed at sparking conversation about the plight of sexual violence against women.

In Brussels, there is now a museum that has a display of clothes that rape victims were wearing when it happened, from different ages and genders. Liesbeth Kennes told VRT1 Radio ‘There is even a children’s shirt with an image of ‘My Little Pony’ in the exhibition, which brings home a harsh reality’ this shows that it’s definitely not just through wearing clothes that may show too much it’s about what’s going on in people’s heads. Rapists don’t care on what age the victims are. There are signs beside the clothes of what the victims responses as to being asked what they where wearing talking about how it has affected their favourite colour because they wore a top that colour when it tragically happened.

There needs to be a stop put towards glorifying rape because of what the victim is wearing, how much they have drank and even what their gender is. There is no right reason to rape or sexually assault someone because there’s never an excuse to do it never mind having a right reason to do so. Instead of just movements and campaigns there should be a more demanding way to put a stop to letting people away with rape to start with no more holding underwear up in court, no more saying people deserved what happened because they were drunk, no more saying it was to do with what someone was wearing. But definitely no more saying it was their gender that caused it to happen. To make it even better start blaming the rapist and assaulter, start seeing what made the rapist do it, what was going through their head to find out why they thought what they were doing was the right thing.

New Laws That Protect The Police And Men Are Trivializing Hate Crimes

In May this year, a bill offering protection from attacks committed against police officers on the basis of “actual or perceived status” was enacted in the United States, and all 50 states are allowed to impose penalties for such an offense. Then, just this October, a call to consider crimes motivated by misandry, or the hostility toward men, was pushed in England after a Member of Parliament, Stella Creasy, campaigned for misogyny, or hostility toward women, to be treated as prejudice for hate crimes. Hate crimes are crimes directed at people of a certain race, religion, or sexual orientation, and in some cases disability. But should assaults against law enforcement officers and men be categorized in the same way? Do these groups really need protection under the law?

Police attacks are rising The Fraternal Order of Police, National Association of Police Organizations, and the National Sheriffs’ Association expressed their support over “The Protect and Serve Act,” which aims to protect law enforcement officers from assaults committed against them for simply being a police officer. The supporters argued that attacks against them have increased between the late 2000s and early 2010s, citing a report from the Department of Justice. Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah explained in a statement that “the Protect and Serve Act of 2018 makes clear that no criminal will be able to escape justice when he singles out and assaults those who put on the badge every day to keep us safe.” He added that attacks on police officers are also attacks committed against the rule of law.

The Act is patterned after the federal hate crime statute. Misogyny vs. Misandry Labor MP Stella Creasy wanted to place crimes motivated by misogyny under hate crimes, arguing that women are harassed at a higher level than men. Her campaign backfired with Minister Baroness Williams’ counter argument of treating misandry as part of the hate crime statute as well. If an offense is tagged as a hate crime, it will be given stronger penalties, such as longer prison sentences and fines compared to an ordinary offense. The counter-argument on misandry is an all too common outcry when women finally decide to speak out and uphold their rights. In the era of #MeToo, men and other sympathizers are quick to defend, “not all men” or “what about us?”

In the process, these people undermine the struggles that many discriminated groups like women face every day. When the Law Commission decided to consider misandry as a hate crime statute, in the same way that it is considering misogyny, it blurred the lines and trivialized the impact of crimes motivated by hate. Today, it is already easy to blame women even if they are, by accounts and evidence, the victims of abuse. All too often, they are scrutinized from the way they dress, what time they go home, for drinking too much or for not asking for help. Jessica Eaton, writing for The Guardian, said that making misandry a hate crime will only open more excuses for abusive men. She noted that misogyny has been present in our cultural and scientific history, which has revealed the sheer oppression of women. “When we talk about misogyny, we are talking about the global societal issue of the life-threatening prejudice, hatred, harm, oppression, rape, marginalization, and harassment of women and girls purely based on their gender—millions of women and girls being mutilated, sold, objectified, dehumanized, and even murdered for being female.”

A false narrative Opponents of the Protect and Serve Act argue that the bill presents a false narrative of a “war on police” and extends protection to groups that do not need them. The American Civil Liberties Union, Human Rights Watch, The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, and the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, called on the Senate to oppose the bill. In an open letter, the organizations said: “Rather than focusing on policies that address issues of police excessive force, biased policing, and other police practices that have failed these communities, the Protect and Serve Act’s aim is to further criminalize.” Meanwhile, for Eaton, talking about the struggles of women is not about leaving men behind. She said, “This is not because we believe that men are not harmed, that men cannot be abused or that men cannot be oppressed – but because misandry seems to be thrown around (generally at women) for some pretty tenuous things that definitely are not hatred or hostility to men.”

Crimes against race, religion, and sexual orientation are tagged as hate crimes because there is a concrete, culturally and statistically proven evidence that people of color, Muslims, and transgenders are usually being attacked for simply being themselves. This is not the same case with law enforcement officers and men. These two groups usually hold positions of power in the society and extending hate crime to them could possibly lead to more abuses and more hate, creating a false dichotomy of protesters versus police officers and women versus men. Chief Constable Sara Thornton, one of UK’s senior police officers, said that rather than focus on misandry and misogyny, better policing for crimes should be addressed. “We all think misogyny and misandry are an issue…I’m questioning whether a criminal offence is the best way of dealing with what is essentially an issue about how we all treat each other,” she concluded.

Rape Culture In Australian Society

By definition, rape culture is an environment in which rape is not only pervasive but also trivialised due to societal attitudes about gender and sexuality shaped by customs and stereotypes formed by society (Waweru Nduta, 2018). Although the term was generated recently, this horrendous pattern of ignorance reflects on an already existing custom that dates back to medieval time. Rape culture is present in our nation like cutlery in a house and has intensely increased over the years. Reports of rape and attempted rape recorded in 2017/18 has increased up to 60 per cent compared to ones recorded in 2011/12 (WordsWorth Matt, 2018).

We, as a sophisticated community is no longer oblivious to the disputes regarding rape culture- what we don’t realize is that we’re encouraging the issue by overlooking it. We cannot turn our backs on our fellow citizens. We cannot choose to walk away from our problems my longer. We cannot afford to ignore this serious matter anymore. We need to take a stand in order to support our fellow Australians for the sake of the wellbeing of our country.

Rape Culture hasn’t only affected Australia’s past, but also has a gigantic impact on the present and by the looks of it, it will continue to influence our future as a community. The new generation is developing in a society where rape culture is often overlooked or treated like a social norm, which is consciously directing them to not only accept but also perform the injustice. Health experts claim that Children behave in ways they perceive their environment expects them to. Gender roles are influenced both by genes and environment. This implies that children copy adult role models such as parents or teachers.

Therefore, if they see their parents doing fixed jobs- such as, father always fixing the car and mother always cooking. They will start believing that specific jobs are only meant for women and some are only for men preventing them from doing jobs that aren’t supposedly made for them. This is where gender inequality emerges. Children grow up with stereotypes and social pressure to be a certain way which shapes their behaviour and personality. At a young age, boys are expected to act tough and always take control of situations. Whilst on the other hand, girls are expect to dress a certain way, take extra precaution with their behaviour and have limited time to stay out. These stereotypes start off insignificantly, but in the bigger picture, majority these children grow up with to be narrow-minded adults who have been too focused on pleasing their society’s standards that they cannot differentiate between justice and injustice. They say all the little things add up. This is not the message we want to send out children, is it?

The insignificance of a woman’s identity is contributing to the rape culture in Australian society and normalizing the injustice of what is righteous and what is not in our communities.

Rape Culture As A Real Modern Issue

For a moment, think about the six most important women in your life. One of six women throughout their lifetime will be raped. That could be one of the six most important women in your life. Rape and sexual harassment are issues which are growing in our society and we are only accomplices to rape if we are not part of the solution. Why do some people think rape is okay? Here’s why. The media. The media projects this idea that a woman’s consent does not matter. You can see this most obviously in pop songs.

Take the song ‘Blurred Lines’ for instance. It’s a well-known, catchy song. I even got it stuck in my head whilst writing this. However, you’ve probably never considered that it’s a song about rape. In an article titled ‘From the Mouths of Rapists’ several rape victims came forward to share what their attacker had said to them. Some quotes prove to sound like lyrics from Thicke’s song. He sings “I know you want it” multiple times throughout the song, this is a phrase that many rape victims hear their attackers say to defend their actions. After, he goes onto sing “but you’re a good girl” which suggests that a ‘good girl’ won’t show her mutual desire. For these ‘good girls’, saying nothing suggests consent and no actually means yes.

It’s not a new argument to suggest that many components of rape culture are installed in seemingly enjoyable elements of pop culture like songs, films, television shows etc. Robin Thicke’s song proved to be an example to many of how we not only tolerate rape culture – but how we also consider it as ‘sexy’.

Rape culture is when lyrics of Robin Thicke’s ‘Blurred Lines’ reflect the words of actual rapists and is still the number one song in the country for twelve weeks. Compared to Thicke’s ‘Blurred Lines’ Justin Bieber’s hit single ‘What Do You Mean?’ has not been as controversial. The idea that women do not actually know what they want and are notably bad at communicating is common in society.

In the song, Bieber asks his partner “What do you mean? / When you nod your head, yes, but you want to say no/ What do you mean?”. Although the song is about a woman who can’t make up her mind about Bieber, their relationship and sexual intimacy, the woman in the music video isn’t portrayed that way. It’s worth noting that in the music video he is frightening her in the name of love – also a part of rape culture. Bieber is portrayed as the ’good guy’ throughout the song by attempting to unriddle what the woman means. The music video alongside the lyrics works in a way that hides what the lyrics really mean, this contradicts what we are shown in the video. Sexualizing a woman’s inability to make a decision is a critical way in how rape culture works.

Last year when I was out for lunch during a school day, there was a large group of boys in front of me and my friends. We could overhear them laughing and making crude comments. At one point, one of the boys said, “let’s stop walking so we can look at the girls’ bums behind us”. My friends and I were beyond humiliated and tried to stay where we were. They just stopped walking and forced us to walk in front of them, we pushed through and started walking faster so we could just get our lunch and not have to deal with them. A short time later, we could hear them shouting at us to lift our skirts up. We were in public. There was a teacher behind us who didn’t say a word. The following day at lunch, we saw them again and crossed the road, hoping they wouldn’t see us. I, as a fifteen-year-old girl, should not have to be scared of boys harassing me in any scenario.

Earlier I mentioned an article in which rape victims bravely came forward to share what their rapists had said to them before, during and after their attack. A contributing factor to rape culture is victim blaming. Victim blaming, by definition, is a belittling act where the victim of a crime, accident or abusive mistreatment is held accountable or partially responsible for the wrongful conduct committed against them. In this article, victim blaming can be shown through quotations such as:

“You can’t have a drink with someone and not expect this not to happen.”

“It wasn’t rape. You were being such a tease.”

Everybody knows that if a woman dances with a man it means she wants to sleep with him, correct? And if she wears a tight dress or a short skirt, correct? And if she smiles at someone, she wants it, correct? Absolutely not. A dance, smile or an outfit is not an invitation and definitely doesn’t indicate consent. This idea is commonly believed by rapists.

People will say “But they’re just pop songs, they don’t mean anything”. Actually, they do. The more songs like this that continue to be released, the more normalised rape will become. Imagine growing up listening to these songs and thinking that someone’s consent does not matter or that rushing somebody to decide about sexual intimacy is okay. This will happen if we continue the way we are now and don’t fight to put a stop to rape culture.

Small but effective ways to stop rape culture can be to not laugh at rape jokes and if someone makes one, criticize them. Teach your peers, friends and family about the importance of consent, resist slut shaming and victim blaming. Don’t be a bystander.

Rape culture is real and is a growing problem. It can be shown through seemingly innocent songs such as ‘Blurred Lines’ or ‘What do you mean?’ and through more recent news like the #MeToo movement. The solution here is simple. We must stop telling victims how to conduct themselves so that they can avoid rape. It is about teaching future generations to respect one another and stop glorifying the act of rape. More people are being outraged by rape culture due to the internet, but there is still a lot of work to be done. Rape culture can end but in order for that to happen, we must be better.

The Effects of Hate Crimes on Society

Hate crimes motivated by race and ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity and disability have impacted the United States for decades and affected numerous marginalized groups. According to the United States Department of Justice, there have been 7,106 single-bias incidents of hate crimes totaling 8,493 victims in 2017. The most common motivation of hate crimes is race and ethnicity. In fact, 58.1% of those hate crimes were motivated by race and ethnicity (Justice.gov,2017). Hate crimes have a devastating impact on communities and families. Despite their serious-nature, there have been cases where individuals have taken advantage of the public and staged hate crimes. Hate crime hoaxes are rare, but when identified damage the credibility of true victims, contribute to the culture of fake news and validate political biases.

In January 2019, Jussie Smollett an actor for Fox’s American drama series “Empire” claimed he was attacked by two Donald Trump supporters on a chilly night in Chicago. Smollett is both a black man and member of the LGBTQ+ community who recounted that the two men beat him, put a rope around his neck and slandered him with racist and homophobic comments. Among the rude remarks, the men shouted, “This is MAGA country!” The news story went viral across social media platforms instantly; Socially liberal people were particularly affected by the hate crime and took to sites such as Twitter to express their dismay. However, the Chicago police department informed people shortly afterward that the crime is a hoax (Nytimes.com,2019).

Smollett was arrested on a felony charge for a fake police report involving paying two co-conspirators by the names of Olabinjo Osundario and Abimbola to stage a hate crime. The men assisted him in planning and carrying out the calculated stunt. Despite his efforts to capitalize off a story fueled by hate, there was too many holes in his plot for the actor to get away with it. Smollett hoped the situation would make him more famous and profitable because he was unsatisfied with his salary on the show “Empire”. Contrary to his belief, the situation did far more damage to his reputation than good in the end. Smollett’s false report is not only damaging to him as an individual, but also devastated marginalized communities such as black and LGBTQ+ groups. This is because his false report undermines the credibility of victims of true hate crimes and efforts. Hate crimes already go largely unreported and Smollett has contributed to a politically-tense environment that will only aggravate the issues victims face when not feeling comfortable to reach out for help (NBC News, 2019).

Additionally, the situation provoked numerous headlines that flooded our social media timelines with fake news, impacting the greater news context. Many fake sources that are circling claim hate crime reports are often false. Smollett’s narrative is used as an example to justify these accusations. In reality, hate crimes are far more often true than not. The New York Times states that, “Hoaxes are not tracked formally, but the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University, San Bernardino, said that of an estimated 21,000 hate crime cases between 2016 and 2018, fewer than 50 reports were found to be false. The center believes that less than 1 percent of all reported hate crimes are false” (Nytimes.com, 2019). This quote demonstrates how few cases of hate efforts turn out to be hoaxes. Jussie Smollett has misleadingly caused people to believe that hate crimes do not occur and contributed to the spreading of misinformation.

On top of that, Smollett has deepened the political divide of individuals in the United States. Since he is black, a member of the gay community and attempted to use these features to enhance his “perfect” victim story, socially conservative people use this case to validate their own biases against these communities for “exaggerating” hate crime efforts. When Smollett created a dramatic story in which racist Donald Trump supporters attacked him, he was knowingly exploiting racial and political tensions in an attempt to promote his public image. Smollett is only amplifying the false notion that politics are always extremely left- or right-winged and never neutral through the stereotypical, extremist story he crafted. This mindset can be problematic. Stories like Smollett’s widen the political gap between citizens by encouraging their prejudices. When the story was first released, liberal celebrities quickly defended Jussie Smollett and tweeted that most Trump supporters are racist and extreme in the way Jussie Smollett’s script read. After the truth came out, most of the liberal celebrities who spoke out did not update their thoughts online (Page Six, 2019). Meanwhile, conservatives were excited to learn the hate crime is a hoax and share that with the internet. Those who are right-winged hurriedly accused all minorities of having a similar experience and didn’t acknowledge the legitimate issue of hate crimes in our country. This shows how both sides of the political spectrum are quick to believe any story that confirms their pre-conceived ideas about social topics.

All in all, fictional hate crimes impact the way society perceives the credibility of true victims, culture of fake news and political biases. Jussie Smollett’s calculated stunt has negative implications for himself as well as for the black and gay community as a whole. It’s disheartening to see a successful, black and gay celebrity turn against his community and strengthen political divides for the sake of fame and money. Hopefully, his story will serve as a reminder of the importance of fact-checking news stories and the media. The public needs to be critical of stories that exclusively validate and encourage our biases. Although Smollett’s story is a hoax, it is essential to give those who are discriminated against and experience violence a voice that is heard, understood and respected. We must not let the occasional fake story discredit the individuals who are harmed by hate crimes in the United States.

The Meaning And Reasons Of Hate Crimes

There has been a drastic rise in hate crimes over the last decade and it does not look like slowing down. Just shortly before writing this there was an attack on different mosques in New Zealand where over fifty people have died and forty plus more have been injured and are in critical condition.

There is no doubt that this was a heinous hate crime. These atrocious acts were committed by a white supremacist with a message to share to the world, which was that Muslims needed to be eradicated in order to make the world a better place. The most shocking thing about these acts is that the terrorist live streamed his acts via Facebook for millions across the world to see before it was taken down by the social media giants. This means that there were bystanders, in the non-strictest way, witnessing these attacks all over the world from those in the same city to those in different countries.

Many called the police from the safety of their homes to alert them of what was happening and where it was happening, many chose to act in order to stop the vicious acts. This brings me to question whether these people would still act if they were on the street with the gunman or would they act if it wasn’t a gunman but rather just a bully beating up a victim.

The sad reality is that bystanders rarely act when faced with a situation like this in front of them and the action of them not doing anything is valuable to the criminal but when they do act that value goes to the victim. That is what this essay will address whether bystander action can be particularly valuable in instances of hate crime, not only to the victim but also to the criminal. I will first explain what is meant by hate crime and what it involves, then I will explain what bystander action is. When all that is cleared, I will then explain what the reasonings are to suggest that bystander action can be particularly valuable in instances of hate crime, not only to the victim but also to the criminal, as bystander action affects them both. After that, I will then delve into my conclusion and bring this essay to an end.

The first question we need to unravel is what hate crimes are and what they involve. Lim explains that “Although hate crimes tend to be random events, victims of hate crimes are not attacked for random reasons.” (Lim, 2009, p. 109) Chakraborti expounds on hate crimes by stating “Hate crime cuts through numerous themes central to social scientific enquiry, whether this be ‘race’, ethnicity, gender, sexuality or simply ‘otherness’ per se.” (Chakraborti & Garland, 2009, p. 2).

It is clear that hate crimes targets specific people that are “different” or diverse and it is not only those with a different race or a different ethnicity as is popularly thought but rather it affects those with a different religion, sexuality or gender. It is largely thought that hate crimes only affects or has an impact on the direct victims but this is untrue, Lim affirms this by saying “Hate crimes impact society on three interrelated levels: the direct victim, the targeted community group (the victim’s shared community), and intergroup relations.” (Lim, 2009, p. 119) It is clear that hate crime goes beyond the direct victim, those within the same “difference” with the victims will begin to fear if they are next and this affects them mentally. The hate crime also affects the relationship between those in the victim’s community and the larger community in general as those afraid to be targeted next distrust those in the general community. That is not the only myth surrounding hate crimes,

Chakraborti debunks another myth in which many people think a hate crime involves hate, “Hate crimes are not crimes in which the offender simply hates the victim, and in reality crimes do not need to be motivated by hatred at all in order to be classified as a hate crime.” (Chakraborti & Garland, 2009, p. 4). When asked what entails a hate crime, it is popular opinion that hate has to be involved, for obvious reasons, however in actual reality it is not the fundamental principal of the crime.

Previously the Association of Chief Police Officers have defined hate crimes as “Any hate incident, which constitutes a criminal offence, perceived by the victim or any other person, as being motivated by prejudice or hate.” (Association of Chief Police officers, 2018). However, it was deemed to be wrong because as Chakraborti puts it “hate is a slippery, emotive and conceptually ambiguous label that can mean different things to different people, and this has important implications for the way in which we conceive of the offences that fall under its umbrella framework and the actors involved in a hate crime, whether these be victims, perpetrators or agencies of control.” (Chakraborti & Garland, 2009, p. 3).

Hate is a word that means different things to different people and the thing about the law is that the law must be consistent, all the offences and the meanings behind them must be uniform in order for the law to work efficiently and proficiently. Thus, they were faced with a situation where hate is not essential to the commission of a hate crime and that in reality crimes need not be motivated by hatred at all to be considered as a hate crime (Chakraborti & Garland, 2009, p. 8) and the word hate itself was rather unclear and erroneous in defining what hate crime consists of as an offence. “We have seen that the term ‘hate’ is a problematic, ambiguous, and in many cases inaccurate label used to describe the offences with which it is commonly associated, and there is considerable disparity between the various academic and official interpretations of what constitutes a hate crime.” (Chakraborti & Garland, 2009, p. 14)

This problem was swiftly resolved by the Association of Chief Police officers when they changed the definition of hate crime to “Any criminal offence or incident, which may or may not constitute a criminal offence, which is perceived by the victim or any other person, as being motivated by hostility or prejudice towards someone based on a personal characteristic.” (Association of Chief Police officers, 2018, p. 7). The question faced now is that when it is clear that the word hate is a problematic term and it has been removed in totality from the definition, then why do people still call the offences hate crimes. The simple answer is that the media still chose to use the word “hate” in their products because it is dramatic, powerful and sounds violent and we all know words like hate help to sell news and whatever else the media are putting across to viewers. Even if hate crimes were to be changed in name officially, media outlets would still input the hate factor in order to sell what they need to. Hence why hate crimes are still called so.

Hate crimes differ from ordinary crimes in many ways and one of these ways is that with hate crimes there is more psychological damage done, “There is some empirical evidence that hate crimes are more psychologically damaging to the victims than non-hate crimes.” (Rayburn, et al., 2003, p. 1056). This is due to the fact that the victims know that they are being targeted because of a specific characteristic about them. Thus, they blame themselves for having this different characteristic, they believe that they deserve the hate they get and this leads to lower self-esteem and mental problems. Craig confirms this when he maintains that “Their misfortune establishes them as different from others, and this self-perception of deviance contributes to a negative self-image.” (Craig-Henderson, 2009, p. 22) Hate crimes are not just ordinary crimes but they are also “message crimes,” Chakraborti explains this when he asserts that “hate crimes are acts of violence and intimidation directed not only towards the victim but towards the wider community to which he or she belongs, and thereby these crimes are designed to convey a message to this community that they are somehow “different” and ‘don’t belong’.” (Chakraborti & Garland, 2009, p. 5). These are crimes that send a message, and in the case of hate crimes it is not only the victim that gets the messages but also their community group, “As ‘message’ crimes, acts of hate reach ‘into the community to create fear, hostility and suspicion’ and in so doing reaffirm ‘the hegemony of the perpetrator’s and the “appropriate” subordinate identity of the victim’s group.” (Chakraborti & Garland, 2009, p. 5) Hate crimes have the damaging consequences on communities of breaking the communities’ sense of union and cohesion by creating group-based partitions that hinder social relations and incite intergroup violence. (Lim, 2009) It is clear now what hate crimes are, what they entail and who they affect, but before we can proceed to answering the question posed, we must first define what bystander action is and what it entails.

When I searched up bystander in the Oxford English Dictionary, this is the definition I came across “a person who is present at an event or incident but does not take part.” ( Oxford English Dictionary, 1884) It seems to be self-explanatory. When we refer to bystander action, we are referring to what they chose to do in that moment, when they are witnessing an event or an incident, if they chose to act then they took action but if they chose not to act then that in itself is an action, an action of choosing to ignore what is going on. Bystanders are not obliged by law to do anything when witnessing a crime, Laurel gives more details, “The law does not impose a duty to intervene, to rescue, or to prevent harm where doing so poses a risk to oneself.” (Fletcher, 2005, p. 1030) The law is very clear on this point and there have been numerous cases where bystanders could have stopped atrocious acts, such as the murder case of Kitty Genovese in 1964, in which it was claimed that 38 witnesses watched or heard her repeatedly get stabbed and every single bystander failed to intervene. (communitiesinc.org.uk, 2018) But none of these bystanders faced any charges for failing to act. Thus, it is clear that bystanders can take any course of action that they choose without having to fear the consequences and more over if they do choose to act it will be from a sense of morals rather than obligations.

Now that hate crimes and bystander action have been explained sufficiently, we can deal with what reasoning there is to suggest that bystander action can be particularly valuable in instances of hate crime. When it comes to hate crimes bystander actions are particularly important because according to communitiesinc.org.uk bystanders are present in 86% of hate crimes, “Most hate crimes and incidents take place in public space, such as [public transport], streets, shops, and bars. It is hard to imagine those completely deserted. In fact, bystanders are present in up to 86% of cases of crimes.” (communitiesinc.org.uk, 2018) Meaning bystanders and the actions that they take can affect up to 86% of hate crimes, this can either be positively or negatively. I will first deal with why bystander action is valuable to the victim before then turning to examining why it could also be valuable to the perpetrator of the hate crime.

When a bystander witness’s a hate crime and decides to act, rather than ignore, their actions can have a positive effect on both the circumstances the victim is facing and the victim themselves in numerous ways. By acting the bystander can halt the unpleasant incident or stop it from intensifying. (communitiesinc.org.uk, 2018) This is valuable to the victim because it stops them from getting more physically hurt in the incident or stops them from getting hurt at all.

This is important and valuable to the victim because then the victim will not have to face medical issues or even mental issues because a bystander acted before the crime could have been escalated to a level where they would have these issues. When considering hate crimes this is even more valuable because the consequences, whether physical or psychological, are more serious for the victims of such. An additional reason to why bystander actions are particularly valuable to victims is because they support the victim (communitiesinc.org.uk, 2018).

Rayburn explains the intentions of the perpetrator when committing a hate crime, “The intent of the act is to express condemnation, hate, disapproval, dislike, and or distrust for that victim and the group that they are part of.” (Rayburn, et al., 2003) This is made clear to the victim who then goes on to blame themselves, they blame whatever part it is that makes them different, this leads to lower self-esteem and negative thoughts about themselves that can lead to issues such as suicide. Craig enlightens on this “In the wake of a hate crime, victims’ views of themselves are especially likely to be deflated relative to their esteem before victimization. Not only is the hate crime victim likely to feel powerless in the wake of the incident, but because they know that they have been deliberately singled out, they are apt to experience a sense of deviance.” (Craig-Henderson, 2009, p. 22)

However, with bystander action it assures the victim that it is not their fault because it shows that not everyone in that town, city or environment thinks the same thing or are prejudice against them. Rayburn explains this importance “A particularly crucial element in the recovery process appears to be bystanders’ non-judgmental attitudes that reassure the victim’s innocence.” (Rayburn, et al., 2003, p. 1056) It comforts the victim to know that there are people on their side and this allows them to recover from the ordeal quicker because they now know they are not alone and not everyone in their community is prejudice against them. “The feeling of being valued that comes from meaningful social support helps to soothe social pain; people regularly derive a great deal of solace from other people when they are distressed.” (MacDonald & Leary, 2005, p. 207) MacDonald explains that any social anxiety or pain that the victim was facing because of the hate crime will be easier dealt with because of the bystander action. This is very valuable to the victim and the victim’s community. Bystander action is also valuable to victims because it empowers the victim to report the incident, it allows the victim to realise that such events should not be occurring and that it is against the general consensus. This allows the victim to be braver and to take action knowing that others will back them and be behind them. This also applies to the victims’ group, when they see one of their own that has been targeted for hate crime being defended by those that aren’t in the group it gives them confidence to know that the larger community is generally behind them and this confidence allows them to report any incidents, they face no matter how small. This keeps the community intact and does not allow hate crimes to spread.

I have shown reasoning and evidences to suggest that bystander action can be particularly valuable in instances of hate crime for the victim, however a victim is not the only party in a hate crime, there is also the perpetrator or perpetrators and bystander actions are equally valuable to them.

Technically it is not bystander actions that are valuable to them but rather it is the action of the bystanders choosing to ignore their crime that is valuable to them. When a perpetrator is in the act of committing a hate crime and the bystanders chooses to act by ignoring the crime it empowers the criminal. “When people turn away, it gives the message to the offender that their behaviour is normal and acceptable.” (communitiesinc.org.uk, 2018) When they believe that what they are doing is the norm and that people do not have a problem with it or moreover support what they are doing, then this encourages them to continue or even to go and commit another crime. This kind of encouragement is dangerous because it leads to higher rates of hate crime and moreover for the victim it shows to them that the perpetrator is right about them and that the community would rather support acts of crime than support the victim, it leads to lower self-esteem for the victim because they blame themselves and there is no one to show them the support they need but rather it is the perpetrator that is getting the support. “If hate crimes indeed result in a less favourable impression of the victim by third parties, this may partially explain why they are more psychologically damaging to the victim.” (Rayburn, et al., 2003, p. 1057)

This response by the victim is also what makes bystander action valuable to the culprit. The criminal came out with an intention to “send a message,” Perry expounds “Hate crime provides a context in which the perpetrator can reassert his/her hegemonic identity, and at the same time, punish the victim(s) for the individual or collective performance of their identity. In other words, hate motivated violence is used to sustain the privilege of the dominant group, and to police the boundaries between groups by reminding the other of his/her ‘place’.” (Perry & Alvi, 2012, p. 61) With the victims reacting to bystanders action in this way it is clear to the perpetrator that their message has been received loud and clear by them, this is what is valuable to the perpetrator of hate crimes that the message they plan to send through the heinous crimes have been received loud and clear.

In this essay I have clarified the meaning of hate crimes, why it is that people commit such crimes, who they target and indeed what the crimes involve. I have also explained what a bystander is, what bystander action means and involve, even how the non-action by a bystander is indeed still an action. I was asked the question of what is the reasoning to suggest that bystander action can be particularly valuable in instances of hate crime. I have expressed that, first off it is not only valuable to victims as one would think but that it is also valuable to the perpetrators of the crimes. I have shown that when bystanders act in favour of the victim It is valuable because it can halt the unpleasant incident or stop it from intensifying, it can support the victim and it leads to the empowers of the victim to report the incident and heinous crimes they face. Bystander action of ignoring the crime is also valuable to the perpetrator because it empowers the criminal, it makes them believe they are doing the right thing and that they have the support of their community, it also causes the victim to lose self-esteem and this is valuable to the culprit because it makes it clear to them that their message has been received loud and clear by the victims. It is clear that bystander action is valuable to both parties depending on the actions that the bystander takes, I have laid out the reasonings to suggest so and the reasonings are sound.

Hate Crime: The Problems And Related Prejudice Against Refugees And Asylum Seekers In England And Wales

Introduction

Context of the research focus

Acts of violence and discrimination that are motivated by racial and ethnic hatred have a long history and not only in England and Wales (Bowling, 1998) but around the world (Fredrickson, 2001; Iganski and Levin, 2015,p.8). The impact of racial hate crime in some countries, such as Rwanda and Bosnia have had such a profound impact on the members of victimised groups that it has resulted in many people fleeing the country (Iganskin and Sweiry, 2016, p.100). In more recent years however, the main focus has been mostly on the population that are fleeing countries such as Iraq and Syria, where ethnic identity has lead to violence and killings at the hands of Islamic State (Iganskin and Sweiry, 2016, p.6). Across mainland Europe, there has been a increase of intolerance, discrimination and violence directed at asylum seekers and refugees. This has persevered against a backdrop of events like the EU referendum, the European refugee crisis, terrorist attacks in a number of European cities and the growing popularity of far right parties (European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA), 2016).

Why the research is worth doing

According to FRA (2016, p.3), there are only a few European countries that monitor and collect information about hate crimes that specifically target asylum seekers and refugees (Germany, Greece, Finland and the Netherlands). However using information from the police in England and wales there has been a recorded 71,251 incident of race related hate crime in 2017/18. Although this figure shows the extent of the problem of racial hate crime and xenophobia, This dissertation will show that this figure shows very little about the scale of the problem of victimisation against the distinct group of asylum seekers and refugees. While there has been very few studies focussing on this specific population, they are often from outside England and Wales.

Research design

This dissertation will be based upon structured reviews of academic studies from library based research, journal articles and internet search engines. Government and public organisations as well as media reports were found by using the google search engine.

THE SOCIO-POLITICAL CONTEXT OF THE PROBLEM

Just like all crimes, hate crime is a social construct (Hall,2012; Jacobs and Porter, 1998, p3). Victimisation of the ethnic minority has become a major problem for concern in England and Wales and it is important to examine and understand how this became so problematic.

Emergency of hate crime

Hate crime has taken many different forms over the last few decades, this can be be narrowed down to the time period, who you are and your geographical area of living. However for Bowling (1998), hate crime In its current form today can be tracked through government and academical works to a number of key events in UK history. However the tipping point that brought about the concern of modern racial hate crime in England and Wales was the murder of 18 year old Stephen Lawrence in 1993, a black teenager who was killed in a unprovoked gang attack in South-East London (Chakraborki and Garland, 2015; Hall, 2013, P33). After constant campaigning form Stephen’s parents, a public inquiry was launched into finding how the police handled the case of Stephen Lawrence’s death and in 1999 this lead to the publication of the McPherson report. With the publishing of the report the way in which racism was policed and seen by the public had changed, but also brought hate crime to larger standing in the political and academical settings (Hall, 2013,p35).

V​ictims of hate

Many researchers have argued over the years (Garland,2011; Chakraborti and Garland,2012) that in attempts to measure the full extent of hate crime problem many strands of hate crime have developed sub-groups. since the case of Stephen Lawrence Racial hate has been getting more academic research within the UK, however despite this there are sub-groups of victims that get very little attention within debates and academic research, one such group under the race and ethnic brand is that of refugees and asylum seekers (Bhatia, 2017). However despite this being known recent research and studies into hate crime of this subgroup still remains limited to British criminologists (Chakraborti and Garland, 2015; Hall, 2013).

Chakraborti (2015) suggests that asylum seekers and refugees have largely gone unnoticed by academical work and government reports and data because their lack of political and social influence, as well as the language barrier that makes it harder to communicate with victims.

Recognising hate and prejudice

The term ‘hate’ has largely been debated in the literature of hate crime as the main underlying factor of crimes that are labeled under hate crimes are not actually related to the perpetrator hating the victim but are related to prejudice thoughts towards the victim (Hall,2013,p.9).

Prejudice is also the term that is preferred to be used in official documents and definitions that relate to hate crimes, an example of this can be seen the the police hate crime operational guidance, it states that “A hate crime is any criminal offence which is perceived, by the victim or any other person, to be motivated by a hostility or prejudice based on a person’s race or perceived race” (College of Policing, 2014, p4). When looking at concept of prejudice, the work of Gordon Allport (1954), is still largely relevant to scholars today as is considered the starting point of even today’s prejudice research.

Allport work examines how prejudice is embedded into people’s stereotyping of outgroups (a social group that the person does not identify with). In his work Allport developed a five point scale to show the different stages of prejudice. The five stages include ‘anti-locution’ (this includes hate speech), as well as thought ‘avoidance’ and ‘discrimination’, this can also lead to ‘physical attacks’ and in the worst form it can lead to ‘extermination’. Allport stresses that this scale does not show how people advance from one stage to the next and that most people’s prejudice does not develop past the ‘anti-locution’ stage (Hall, 2013, p84).

More recently the work of Jacobs and Potter (1993; 1998) argues that hate crime are actually rarely based on prejudice but are based on other circumstances. An example can be when valued resources such as housing and jobs are hard to come by, this can cause conflicts between two groups and one group blames the other for this (developed more in chapter 3), one such group that usually gets the blame is immigrants. Although Jacobs and Potter also stress the how much prejudice plays a part in racially motivated hate crime. It is important to consider their argument that other factors may play a role in racial hate crime and that the causation of offending against refugees and asylum seekers is not solely down to that of high levels of prejudice.

Concluding comments

This chapter has shown how hate crime was established and recognised as a problem. In particular it has looked at how asylum seekers and refugees are generally overlooked when it comes to the studies and data collection of this group. Finally this chapter has looked out how their are different levels committing hate crime and how prejudice is an important part in understanding hate crime, as well as the argument that prejudice might not be the only factor that causes people to commit racial hate crimes. The next chapter will examine the extent and nature of racial hate and prejudice towards asylum seekers and refugees.

THE EXTENT AND NATURE OF THE PROBLEM

The chapter will begin by reviewing the three main terms that are used when referring to the immigrant population and how these can impact the understanding of experiences, vulnerabilities and situation.then through government data will examine the extent of hate crime that is known and whether asylum applicants are a cause for the increase, the it will compare data from other EU countries to compare the problem. It will also look at who commits hate crimes and examine the reasons into why people commit such crimes.

Difficulties in understanding the terminology

When faced with the problem of tacking crimes towards asylum seekers, refugees and migrants, it is important to understand the difference between the three different label terms as they each have their own definition, however they are commonly misused and are mistakenly used interchangeable of one another. To the public and the media these different terms can become mixed up and be treated just as three different terms for the same definition meaning (Gabrielatos and Baker, 2008). The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Handbook on Procedures and Criteria for Determining Refugee Status (2011) states that a refugee is someone that has been forced to flee their country due to war or violence and that they fear of being persecuted for race, religious, political opinion or because they identify with a particular social group. However before they get the status of ‘refugee’ they must have made a claim for asylum and have had their application successfully granted by the Home Office ​(Edwards, 2015).

An asylum seeker is someone who has fled their country because of persecution and they are seeking international protection from a country but they are still waiting for their claim to be processed to determine there refugee status​(Edwards, 2015)​. However migrants do not move from their country due to fear of prosecution or death, but for other reasons such as better education, to find work or for a better way of life. Migrants who come to the UK from european countries to work or come to work on a work visa are known as ‘economic migrants’. However if they do not come from the EU then they need a valid visa to live/work in the UK, if they do not have one then they are ‘illegal migrants’, research suggests that most illegal immigrants come from countries such as india, nigeria and albania, however most of them came to the UK on valid visas but failed to go home when their visa expired.

The problem when these definitions become blurred is that the public do not know the reason why asylum seekers come to the country and they do not understand the legal protection that asylum seekers require and they do not understand that asylum seekers can cross borders legally to seek asylum.

The Nature of race-hate

Racial hate has taken many forms over the years from grafiti and verbal abuse to psychical violence,arson of property and even murder (Athwal, Bourne and Wood, 2010, p10), the study conducted by Athwal, Bourne and wood analysed 660 cases of racial violence in the media in 2009, their study shows that racial abuse was recorded in 455 of these cases. Although their study did not focus on a specific ethnic population as well only looking at 660 cases which is a very small portion of officially recorded hate crimes. They concluded in their study that asylum seekers, refugees and economic migrants were the groups that were the most likely to be at risk of racially motivated attacks.

The Leicester Hate crime project that was published by Chakrabotri, Garland and Hardy in 2014 is one of Britain’s biggest hate crime studies to date. The study found that almost all the respondents (91 percent) where victims of racial verbal abuse and that over two thirds (73 percent) have been victims of racial harassment in the form of bullying and other threatening behaviour, and that almost half (42 percent) where victims of crimes that caused damage to their property that were believed to racially motivated. Other studies that specifically focuses on refugees and asylum seekers also found that they victims of other racially motivated harassment and abuse such as; being spat on, shouted at, being beaten (both themselves and their kids) and being threatened with knives (Bhatia, 2015; 2017). Chakraborti (2014, p. 18) believes that such low level acts of everyday prejudice is a largely neglected area of research, despite they represent the main types of victimisation.

The official problem

In England and Wales, attempts to find the full scale of the problem of racist hate crime relies on crime data that is recorded by the police and then published by the home office. The latest statistical bulletin from the home office (2018​a​, p12) shows that racial hate crime has constantly been increasing over the past six years, increasing from 35,944 racial hate crimes in 2011/12 to 71,251 in 2017/18, with a recorded 62,685 in 2016/17 that is an increase of 14%. With the constant rise of hate crime over the years Awan and Zempi (2017) suggest that the increase can be related to ‘trigger’ events such as the EU referendum vote in 2016 and the Manchester and london attacks of 2017, this leads to the increasing in both commiting and the reporting of hate crime. This can be seen by the spikes in the recorded data around the time of these events (see figure 2.2, Home Office, 2018​a​, p14). However it is difficult to determine how many of the 71,251 recorded racial hate crimes are based upon prejudice to someones refugee or asylum status as race hate crimes are only recorded based on their ethnicity or country of origin.

As Well as data that is recorded by the police, the Crime Survey of England and Wales (CSEW) can be another way of gathering statistical data on racial hate crimes. The most recent CSEW that covers the years of 2017/18 show that their was around 101,000 hate crime incidents reported to them (Home Office, 2018​a​, p21). However just like the police database, the CSEW coverage of racial hate does not go beyond that of ethnicity so there is still no record of how many of these incidents where related to asylum seekers or refugees. Iganski (2011) suggests that the lack of subgroups in the data is because of the way in which victims are recorded under such broad bands such as racial and ethnical victimisation.

However if ignoring the limitations of subgrouping the data the two individual databases show that there is a significant difference in the amount of racial hate crimes that are being reported with the CSEW having 29,251 more recorded incidents than the police. However although there has been a constant increase of racial hate crime, data from The Home Office (2018b) also shows that in the year ending June 2018 the UK received 27,044 applications for asylum, this was down one percent from the previous year. From these applicants only 14,308 were granted refugee status, this was down 12 percent lo compared to the year before which was 16,215 successful grants of asylum. Comparing the rise is racially motivated hate crimes to the amount of applicants for asylum in the UK, it shows that racial crimes are rising although the amount of asylum seekers coming into the UK is decreasing.

PERPETRATOR PROFILE

When attempting to build a profile it is important to note that anyone can commit a hate crime as stated in Williams and Tregidga (2013, p.13) ‘anyone can be a hate crime perpetrator regardless of age, race and gender’. However several studies have found similar traits between the perpetrators. A majority of the studies found that the perpetrators are usually young white men, this supports the assumption that hate crimes are committed by those in the majority group (Chakraborti et al, 2014, p.56; Iganski and Smith, 2011; Williams and Tregidga,2013,p.46). When looking at data from the Leicester hate crime project, they found that 37 percent of the perpetrators were aged 19 or younger and that 32 percent where between 20 and 30 years of age (Chakraborti et al, 2014). A similar studies that was conducted in sweden that focused specifically on hate crime against immigrants also suggested that a majority of the perpetrators were also young males (Bunar, 2007).

The most commonly suggested cause of why people offend is due to the socio-economic situation (Iganski et al, 2011, p.11; Ray and Smith,2002, p.95). Research that was conducted in the US also suggest other factors into why people commit hate crime, it suggests that people who have come from a dysfunctional background, have had poor educational or have had a bad upbringing (Levin and McDevitt, 1993; McDevitt, Levin, and Bennett, 2002). Similar findings have also been found in studies that have been conducted in England and Wales (Gadd et al, 2005; Ray and Smith,2002; p.95). Finally, research has also suggested that drugs and alcohol misuse are also common features in racial offenders (Gadd et al, 2005; p.9).

The above research has provided a big insight into the profile of perpetrators of racial hate crimes, despite this making a profile that covers general racial hate crime as well as gathering information on people who target asylum seekers and refugees is still very difficult to construct. When looking at the case of asylum seekers and refugees this is due to despite asylum seekers and refugees having small mentions in studies from within England and Wales (Chakraborti et al, 2014; Gadd et al, 2005; Williams and Tregidga, 2013), there was has been no asaysis breakdown as to which sub-group under racial hate crimes where being victimised and by whom.

Finally, the main reason why a profile is hard to establish is because many studies have been from a victim based view and that is is hard to research the offender’s perspective from this type of research (Bowling and Phillips, 2003; Williams and Tregidga, 2013; .138). As mentioned above it is hard to build a profile from victim based research as it does not help in understanding the motives into why people commit hate crimes. This can be seen in the leicester hate crime project (Chakraborti et al, 2014, P.22) as many victims believe that they are being targeted because of characteristics such as their age, race, appearance or religion and not because of their asylum or refugee status. This shows that without further studies into the offenders perspective, it is very difficult to understand why they target someone and for what reason.

Concluding comments

This chapter has attempted to understand the extent and nature of racial hate crimes towards asylum seekers and refugees but has found that it is difficult to fully understand the extent as the data gathered by government agencies and crime victimisation surveys does not break it down soley to look at asylum seekers and refugees but at racial hate crime in general. Attempts to get accurate data towards asylum seekers and refugees will be hard to collect due to the possible consequences that they might face if they report a crime to the police, this leads to asylum seekers and refugees not reporting any crimes that they are victims to.