The hate crimes law is basically a law enacted in the United States to protect against bias crimes hate crimes which are motivated by hostility and animus against a protected class. In every state, the law has variations in the current statutes that it has with regard to the kind of penalty a person is given if found guilty of hate crimes.
Mainly, this law has been modified and President Obama passed a hate crime bill that permits federal prosecution for hate crimes that are committed for the person’s race, ethnicity, nationality, religion, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation or disability. In the past, the hate crimes law just covered a limited federal jurisdiction over the hate crimes in that the victim would have to be attacked while he or she was engaged in a federally protected activity like attending school.
Historically, the hate crimes law and the hate crimes bill stems from the 1964 federal civil rights law which permits the federal prosecution of anyone who willingly injures or interferes with another person by force because of the other individual’s race, color, religion or national origin. Then the violent crime control and law enforcement act of 1994 was enacted which requires the United States Sentencing Commission to increase penalties for hate crimes. They were only implemented and applied on federal crimes though.
With the signing of the Matthew and James Byrd, Jr. hate crimes prevention act by President Obama on October 28, 2009, the federal hate crime law is now expanded to included crimes motivated by a victim’s gender, gender identity, sexual orientation or disability. The part that states the victim has to be engaging in a federally protected activity has been dropped.
There is still a debate as to how this expansion in the law would affect the penalties for those found guilty of hate crimes.
