Good Intentions

Abstract

This article explores the practical enforcement of laws that increase criminal penalties for bias-related crimes. A review of the literature suggests that penalty-enhancement statutes are meeting some of their goals. At the same time, police implementation is highly variable, prosecutions are rare, and convictions are even rarer. This article summarizes the practical and legal hurdles to enforcement of hate crime laws, including issues regarding enforcement by local police, difficulties in proving motivation, and controversies surrounding deterrence and the larger societal impact of the laws. Because hate crime laws have been operationalized with little or no attention to societal power dynamics and social inequalities, their paradoxical consequences may include disproportionate punishment of minorities whom they were intended to protect. Furthermore, hate crime laws shine their spotlight on relatively powerless individuals at the bottom of the social order and away from the societal institutions that promote or condone discriminatory conduct.