CT Hate Crime
In Connecticut, it is a felony crime to intimidate someone based on bigotry or bias. A person can be charged with this crime when they are found to have maliciously and intentionally intimidated or harassed someone based on their perceived race, religion, sexual orientation, ethnicity, disability, sex or gender identity and caused physical injury.
In June 2021, Gov. Ned Lamont appointed members to a newly formed Connecticut Hate Crimes Advisory Council. The council is housed within the Office of the Chief State’s Attorney and its members are tasked with encouraging and coordinating programs that increase community awareness and reporting of hate crimes to combat those crimes, according to the state.
Anyone who is a victim of a hate crime or witnesses a hate crime in Connecticut is asked to call 911, contact a local police department, call 1-800-CALL-FBI or submit a tip anonymously at tips.fbi.gov. The Connecticut State Police Hate Crimes Investigative Unit can be reached at hate.crimes@ct.gov.
The US Department of Justice also tracks hate crimes by state. Read more here. Connecticut statistics can be found here.
Connecticut hate incidents:
According to the Anti-Defamation League of Connecticut, there has been a 265% increase in hate incidents recorded in Connecticut in the last four years.
In March 2023, In March, the Anti-Defamation League reported that antisemitic incidents surged to record highs in Connecticut in 2022, with a 100% increase from the year before. There were 68 antisemitic incidents recorded in the state in 2022, according to the ADL, up from 34 in 2021. The sharp increase outpaces the 36% rise in incidents nationally, data shows.
Read more here:
CT officials, advocates condemn hate crimes as data shows rise in incidents
US hate crime:
In the United States, reported hate crimes rose by 7% from 2021 to 2022, reflecting changes in societal biases and prejudices. Crimes motivated by race, ethnicity, or ancestry constitute 56% of all reported hate crimes. USAFacts has data on how factors motivating these crimes have shifted to provide a better understanding of who is being targeted.
Overall, racially motivated crimes decreased. However, anti-Black or African American hate crimes rose by 4% to number 3,434 out of 6,570 reported race/ethnicity/ancestry cases. Meanwhile, the reported number of hate crimes targeting Asian Americans dropped from 753 in 2021 to 499 in 2022.
Anti-transgender hate crimes increased by 35%, making up 338 of the 469 reported gender identity hate crimes. Gender identity crimes had the highest year-over-year increase across all categories.
Religiously motivated hate crimes were up 27%, the second-largest year-over-year increase in all categories. Antisemitic hate crimes rose 36%. Of the 2,044 reported hate crimes based on religion, 1,124 were anti-Jewish.
In 2022, white Americans accounted for 51.0% of known hate crime offenders, while comprising 60.9% of the US population. Black or African American people, making up 12.2% of the US, constituted 21% of hate crime offenders. Asian Americans, 5.9% of the US, were 2.0% of the offenders.
Read more here.
Anti-Semitism since October 2023:
It needs to be noted that antisemitic incidents in the US have risen dramatically since October when Hamas attacked Israel.
The Anti-Defamation League said it recorded 2,031 antisemitic incidents nationwide between Oct. 7 and Dec. 7, which is up significantly from 465 incidents during the same two-month period in 2022. The latest numbers represent a 337% increase in reports compared with last year. It is also the highest number of any two-month period since the ADL began tracking antisemitic incidents in in 1979. Most of the incidents — at least 1,411 — “could be clearly linked to the Israel-Hamas war,” according to the group.