What counts as ‘evidence’ of hate crimes?

1. Go to the Bureau of Justice Statistics (bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov) website and find a publication that presents statistics on victimizations perceived to be motivated by hate. How does the BJS specifically define a hate crime? How do they measure crimes motivated by hate? How is racial bias measured? What counts as ‘evidence’ of hate crimes?

2.Go to the Rape Victim Advocates website at www.rapevictimadvocates.org (Links to an external site.) Go to “Myths and Facts.” Discuss some facts about rape that you were previously unaware of or some myths you believed. How is rape specifically defined by the Department of Justice? How is it measured? How does rape differ from sexual assault? How is sexual assault measured differently from rape?

3. What did you learn about hate crimes. How are hate crimes conceptualized and measured? What did you learn about rape? How is rape conceptualized and measured? Explain how you will specifically define and measure the key concepts and variables you are analyzing for your research proposal?

4. What are the latest national trends in crime? Write a short statement with respect to causation after inspecting the Federal Bureau of Investigation Uniform Crime Report at www.fbi.gov (Links to an external site.) (go to ‘statistics’ section under “Reports & Publications”). What specific types of crimes have increased? Decreased? What causal explanations (cause and effect) can you provide? Are your explanations grounded in the scholarly literature?

5 Go to the Disaster Center website at www.disastercenter.com/crime/ (Links to an external site.). Review the crime rate nationally and, by picking out links to state reports, compare the recent crime rates in two states. What types of crimes are on the rise? What type of crime has decreased? Propose a causal explanation for variation in types of crime between states, over time, or both? What causal explanations do criminologists propose?

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