Rethinking newcomer and minority offending and victimization: beyond hate crimes

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Rethinking newcomer and minority offending and
victimization beyond hate crimes

• Metropolis Justice, Policing and Security
  Seminar Building an Empirical EvidenceFebruary
  25, 2008Ottawa, Ontario

Derek Janhevich Melanie Bania Ross Hastings
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Main structure of the discussion paper

• Outline current government sponsored efforts
  General Social Survey on Victimization Pilot
  Survey on police-reported hate crimes and changes
  to Uniform Crime Reporting Survey Ethnic
  Diversity Survey
• Despite these efforts, concept of hate crime
  still problematic and much of the research has
  been largely descriptive and exploratory
• Need to take a broader stance to understand risk
  and protective factors
• The case of Toronto guns, gangs, vulnerable
  groups and neighbourhoods

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What we know and need to know
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Pulling the pieces together a conceptual
approach
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Conclusions and Recommendations

• Not all discrimination and racism is hate crime
  generalizing may lead to improper policy
  responses which rely only on criminal justice
  system
• A better understanding of the risk, protective,
  situational and systemic factors
• Current understanding is too descriptive and
  exploratory
• Municipalities, neighbourhoods and communities
  are not generic therefore diagnostics need to be
  more local
• Need to re-think the role of the criminal justice
  system
• CJS not equipped to deal with existing tensions
• More focus on municipally and community driven
  solutions