Racially Motivated Attack? Is the media biased?

[jonnythan]

In both cases, the thought wasn't the crime.

The act of murder was the crime.

I'm done.

 

[Tomorrow]

(1) Bob kills Andy. Bob killed Andy with weapon A in manner B in a time frame of C, at location D. Bob was thinking 'hate', as Andy is a different skin color, and his thought of 'hate' is why he killed Andy.

(2) Bob kills Andy. Bob killed Andy with weapon A in manner B in a time frame of C, at location D. Bob was thinking 'fun', because Bob finds pleasure in killing.

In many states, (2) would bring a lesser sentence than (1), as (1) qualifies for hate crime status. The difference? What the offender was thinking. So, under a specific condition, you are in fact making specific thought in itself, a punishable crime. That is only the start of it, if one is to base historical evolution of law making, where laws typically expand/evolve to cover more things/circumstances.



This is getting into trial procedure, which is not my intent here. I posed examples, where all else being equal, an intentional and specific defined crime was committed, the only variable being the state of thought of the offender. No extenuating circumstances. Not justifiable self defense(or debatable on the fringe of definition as self defense). Offender is sane.

-Chris

Chris,

I think "intention" is salient to the point you're trying to discuss. Intentions are considered in law making and are relevant to the "thought(s)" behind the act. Read 'intentions' = 'thoughts'. Premeditated murder is essentially a different crime (violates a different law) than plain-jane murder, or even aggravated murder. A different law has been broken in each of these cases. Yes, the act was the same, the result was the same, but the intention (thoughts) were different in each.

What's different about this one?.....Bob kills Andy. Bob killed Andy with weapon A in manner B in a time frame of C, at location D. Bob was thinking about something else when an accident happened, because Bob finds no pleasure in killing. This is manslaughter, not murder, even though the results are the same...the intentions/thoughts are different. That is what the law differentiates...intentions or thoughts...just as in the above 3 types of murder. Would you propose that the (accidental) manslaughter perp be given equal sentence with the premeditated murderer? The only thing different about this criminal option is Bob's thoughts.

Edit: As far as I know, especially in the predominantly Judeo-Christian societies like ours, laws have been crafted with perpetrator intentions or state of mind, as an important element. This has great historical depth, by the way. We could do the Bob-and-Andy scenario, but played out during the actions of war. (Bob and Amir?) Then where would that take us?

 

[WmAx]

Would you propose that the (accidental) manslaughter perp be given equal sentence with the premeditated murderer? The only thing different about this criminal option is Bob's thoughts.

I specified intentional murder. Not accidental. I outlined this prior, as well as other conditions and exclusions. Thought is of course relevant in the capacity of determining if it was murder at all. It appears you are extrapolating the use and context of the term 'thought' in this discussion beyond what was intended. But specific thought has no place in determining severity of punishment, once you establish the base line of a malicious illegal killing. If you do, then you are in effect saying it is more permissible to intentionally and maliciously kill in one case vs. another, all other variables being held constant. You are also supporting action against thought crimes, if that is the case. So killing out of hate becomes less permissible than killing out of fun. I see both as equally unacceptable, thus equally subject to the same strict penalties. If there were other conditions that release this killing from the definition of murder, then it automatically is not a murder that is at subject here. Accidental killing does not qualify for the malice component of murder. Insanity does not qualify, if the insanity at subject made the person not able to realize what actions are occuring and the resulting consequences. Self defense automaticly releases one from murder, as it is not for reasons of direct malice that the killing occurs, but protection of one's self from malicious intent of another. Defense of another is the same thing, with another angle: protecting another's life from one that wishes to maliciously harm someone.

We could do the Bob-and-Andy scenario, but played out during the actions of war. (Bob and Amir?) Then where would that take us?

Was it murder(intentional illegal killing with malice)? Or ordered killing by superiors for reasons directly relevant to the war? Not even military commanders or soldiers are immune to the rules. This has been demonstrated in the past, with soldiers and/or military commanders being prosecuted for various war crimes. It might be easier to get away with murder in war zones(it could be more difficult to identify a murder as opposed to an ordered kill or kill resultant of combat, based on the number of deaths in the area, and statistical issues involved with investigation of such a large number of incidents), however, this does not make it any less vile.

-Chris

 

[Tomorrow]

You are also supporting action against thought crimes, if that is the case. So killing out of hate becomes less permissible than killing out of fun. I see both as equally unacceptable, thus equally subject to the same strict penalties.

-Chris

No, you misunderstand me. I am not supporting action against thought crimes. I am only referring you to the legal tradition of our country...which, in the case of murder, is based upon criminal intent. What you are calling a "thought crime", I am saying is a crime of intention under the law. You can say they do or do not differ, but the law only differentiates these kinds of similar crimes via intention. There are different laws under which perpetrators are prosecuted. One is Premeditated Murder with malice aforethought. Another is Aggravated Murder, killing in the act of commission of another crime. Etc. The thought process was indeed different with these perpetrators. So was their intent. And it is intent which is historically governed by law, not their thoughts.

 

[jonnythan]

Tomorrow, I don't know why WmAx insists on calling these thought crimes. There's no logic or reason to it.

I'd suggest just leaving him be.

 

[WmAx]

You can say they do or do not differ, but the law only differentiates these kinds of similar crimes via intention. There are different laws under which perpetrators are prosecuted. One is Premeditated Murder with malice aforethought. Another is Aggravated Murder, killing in the act of commission of another crime. Etc. The thought process was indeed different with these perpetrators. So was their intent. And it is intent which is historically governed by law, not their thoughts.

Thank you for the clarification. Obviously, intent is crucial to determine the actual crime committed, if any at all. I agree with that. I am critical of changing a sentence based purely on the details of thought, as opposed to a general state of mind(this is intent). There is a difference. As one state of mind can be defined as intentional and malicious (murder) and another state of mind can be defined as accidental(manslaughter). But the popular notion today seems to be to move beyond this basic set of determinations, and proceed to criminalize specific thoughts beyond the general state of mind/intent and actual physical actions committed. In my A and B comparison you originally replied to, the intent, actions and results were identical(malicious and intentional killing).

-Chris

 

[Tomorrow]

Thank you for the clarification. Obviously, intent is crucial to determine the actual crime committed, if any at all. I agree with that. I am critical of changing a sentence based purely on the details of thought, as opposed to a general state of mind(this is intent). There is a difference. As one state of mind can be defined as intentional and malicious (murder) and another state of mind can be defined as accidental(manslaughter). But the popular notion today seems to be to move beyond this basic set of determinations, and proceed to criminalize specific thoughts beyond the general state of mind/intent and actual physical actions committed. In my A and B comparison you originally replied to, the intent, actions and results were identical(malicious and intentional killing).

-Chris

I think I understand where you're coming from, Chris, especially in the matter of "Hate Crimes". Personally, I believe virtually all violent crimes against (any) persons are crimes of hate...so why differentiate in the law?

But then, I'm old and Polish and easily confused.

 

[Jack Hammer]

Stop thinking only about murder...

You have to look at these things in their simplistic form, not the "if some one dropped an atomic bomb" form. The original intent of "Hate Crimes" was to raise misdemeanor charges to felony status and to tack on additional charges against "hate groups." Groups who's terrorize other groups of people based solely on their skin color or sexual preference (or beliefs, etc). Please, lets not get into a debate about what constitutes a hate group, we all know what is meant. The law was not meant to regulate peoples thoughts, just to make more severe the consequences for their violent actions.

Lets forget about murder, debating that isn't really going to resolve or prove much, regarding this topic. Murder is bad, and rarely excusable, and to the best of my knowlege is always a felony (let's not get anal justified murder or self-defense).

The nature of the crimes "Hate crime laws" was meant to deter or severely punish were those that are terroristic in nature. I'm not talking about strapping on dynamite and running into a building. I'm talking about people who want to make other people afraid to go out in public because of how they were born.

The intent was to make those terror inspiring attacks, which legally may be a minor infraction of the law, a felony. An example is: going to a Jewish persons home and spray painting a swastika on their house and throwing a rock through the window. An act clearly done to terrorize the Jewish family there (and possibly other Jews). Before the "hate crime" laws the charges incurred on the perpetrator would have been a misdemeanor vandalism charge. After the laws that same person could be charged with a felony.

Any one remember "fag bashing?" popular in the late 80's, early 90's. Where drunk morons would go into a gay neighborhood at night to find some ones @ss to kick because they were gay. That was misdemeanor assault prior to "hate" laws. Now it's a felony.

It was a great idea for a law that like so many others now gets used out of context from the original intent.

Jack

 

[WmAx]

Lets forget about murder, debating that isn't really going to resolve or prove much, regarding this topic. Murder is bad, and rarely excusable, and to the best of my knowlege is always a felony (let's not get anal justified murder or self-defense).

Replace 'murder' with 'assault' or 'vandalism' or your crime of choice in my examples. It's still valid. In one case, intentional malicious crime is not legally considered as bad as in another case, even though both cases were intentional, malicious and the actions and results are identical.

I'm not arguing that hate crime laws were not well intentioned. But a good idea in a supposed country of freedom, liberty and free speech? Not in my book. Even if they are carried out as intended, and not abused, they still should not be in existence, since they do one thing in bottom line effect: they are criminalizing specific thought as an additional charge or modifying charge to a sentence, instead of directly addressing the actions and basic intent(accident vs. intentional act, etc.).

Why should Bob get a different sentence if he intentionally keys Andy's car for fun, vs. keys Andy's car because he hates his skin color? Both are acts of purposeful vandalism, and I believe both should be dealt with the same seriousness/severity. Frankly, people have the right to think of someone or something else, in any way they like. It's what they actually physically do, in regards to violations of other people's rights/liberties, that must be addressed. At what point is it okay/more permissible to do X thing to a person intentionally for purposes of bias-free fun, as opposed to doing the same X thing intentionally for hate reasons?

For hate crime to be accepted as valid, for example, one has to accept that it is not that big of a deal if a guy of the same race, whom knows what he is doing(he is sane and not suffering from some serious mental defect) paints random things on my/your house in acts of intentional vandalism for his personal fun to my/your property as opposed to if he was of a different race and did it for hate reasons? All other things equal(damage to house, value of damage, intentional destruction of property, etc.). So the 'for fun' intentional act is not that big of a deal?

What counts is the physical actions and basic intent(accident vs. intentional/willful destruction, violence, etc.) of a committed act. I fail to see where in one case, one should consider it less serious, than in another, based only on 'hate' thought, all other things held equal.

-Chris

 

[Jack Hammer]

You have to look at the big picture, and unfortunately it's not pretty...

Chris, for the most part, I actually agree with what you are saying. Unfortunately, not everyone is our society plays on a level field. One of the reasons these laws became somewhat neccessary was because prosecutors were having a lot of trouble doing anything legal to stop these groups from harrassing and terrorizing innocent folk. Some of these groups got wise and started to work around loopholes in the law so when they did get caugth all they legal system could do was give them a slap on the wrist and send them laughing along on their merry way. Meanwhile they were able to continue to harass, terrorize, and victimize people.

Think of it like this. For some time now street gangs have used the under age gang members (minors) to do most of the felony activities of the gangs. They get 14-16 year old kids to shoot rival gang members because if they get caught, they generally get a light sentence in juvenile hall and are out in a few years instead of facing the death penalty (depends on state) or a lengthy prison term. So what happens is some 15 year old kid does a drive-by shooting for the gang and shoots a few innocent bystanders as well as the rival gang member. He gets off with a few years because he is a minor. This still happens quite frequently. They also use the kids to sell drugs for the same reasons.

That examply is one of the reasons they lowered the age that a child could be tried as an adult. With the intent of being able to punish gang bangers who were using a loophole in the law to get off easy and continue doing very bad things. Now the problem is some normal kid does something stupid (and I'm not just talking about murder) and he faces being tried as an adult instead of recieving the second chance that he may actually deserve (think extenuating circumstances). Remember, we were all kids and most of us did some pretty stupid things at one point.

These are the same reasons they came out with the RICO laws to go after the mob. Remember Al Capone, everyone knew what he was doing, but because he never was caught in the act or was somewhere else when something happened they couldn't touch him. They finally got him for tax evasion. In case you don't know, now they cross reference income to net worth, plus all transactions over $3K(?) are reported to the IRS to try to catch big $ criminals.

The list goes on and on. Criminals have gotten smart over the years and work every loophoole that was intended to protect law abiding citizens. It's a very sticky situation. If we give up freedoms to allow these people to be caught, we'll likely never get them back. Many well intentioned laws that really were great ideas end up screwing the people they were intended to protect.

Jack

 

[masak_aer]

Why should Bob get a different sentence if he intentionally keys Andy's car for fun, vs. keys Andy's car because he hates his skin color? Both are acts of purposeful vandalism, and I believe both should be dealt with the same seriousness/severity.

NO. THEY SHOULD NOT.

One purpose of giving punishment is to make the person committing the crime to stop whatever he likes to do when he gets out of jail. I don't believe that Bob who intentionally keys Andy's car because he hates his skin color is going to change that easily to becoming a fair and full of love to Andy's race when he comes out of jail. On the other hand, the other Bob who did that crime for fun, will think twice of having the same fun when he is out of jail. That in my opinion is more possible.

Why there's a hate crime law? That is to forbid and limit those who have the same sick racially biased jerks to come together and assault others. It is also to deter any risk of revenge from the victim's race to the assailant/murderer race. It is not that one act is more permissible than the other act. NO. We are trying to give HARSHER punishment to those who commit the same bottom line result of crime based on the racial/religious/etc hatred (HARSH vs. HARSHER NOT LIGHT vs. HARSHER punishment). Psychologically, it is easier to gather people with the same ideology (change that to race, religion, skin color) and make them do an act of terror THAN to gather people do that thing for the reason of FUN.

We don't punish thoughts. We do punish evil thoughts that are carried out and it's called motive/intention. If all punishment for a murder act, for example, is the same, then how many years should one get? There is no single years of punishment that can and will satisfy all.

 

[Nuglets]

The problem is like wmax said, you are changing the penalties based on what one was thinking at the time of the crime, which is impossible to prove and is very easily abused. Where is the first amendment in this situation?

Think about this...if so many southern white men(KKK and others) hadn't gotten away with assaulting, murdering, and hanging blacks back in the day because an all white jury would find them innocent anyways and even prior to that, if early American's weren't so ignorant as to think black people weren't even people at all and they deserved to be enslaved, then would we have needed a special 'hate-crime' law to turn something into a felony that should have obviously been a felony to begin with? I'm leaning towards no and that is exactly why we don't need one now. Nobody is going to get away with any of the nonsense they were getting away with in the past under today's system of law, so in my opinion that eliminates the need for such a law.

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to understand that everyone should be treated with respect regardless of skin color and maybe if we actually had some decent government funding for education in this country, a child that grows up around ignorant, moronic, parents that still support the KKK might actually learn for him/her self that their parents are sick, disgusting, stupid people. How many educated people do you see that are completely racist because they think they are superior based on skin color alone? Maybe there are some, but from a program I watched on History Channel about the KKK, all I could see is a bunch of morons burning stuff, and talking in a deep southern accent about why they are superior to other races. Leave it to a bunch of redneck idiots to think their race is superior when in reality their own ideology is extremely primitive and proves that they are actually retarded. EDUCATION IS THE KEY TO SUCCESS.

 

[jonnythan]

The problem is like wmax said, you are changing the penalties based on what one was thinking at the time of the crime, which is impossible to prove

If the prosecution does not prove that the crime was a hate crime, then the jury by law does not return guilty as a verdict for the charge of the hate crime.

 

[highfihoney]

If the prosecution does not prove that the crime was a hate crime, then the jury by law does not return guilty as a verdict for the charge of the hate crime.

There are alot of people doing extra time in prisons right now because "options" were left in the hands of the jury,the only thing a jury should be able to decide is guilty or innocent,not the depth of guilt.

 

[jonnythan]

There are alot of people doing extra time in prisons right now because "options" were left in the hands of the jury,the only thing a jury should be able to decide is guilty or innocent,not the depth of guilt.

That is what they decide.

They decide whether the person is guilty of a hate crime or not.

 

[Jack Hammer]

It's just a big mess...

...and unfortunatley the people who think it's stupid may end up doing more damage than good. It's backwards logic, but it goes something like this; when the general public fail to recognize the difference in a law that was intended for a specific purpose and rationalize it as being essentially the same crime(regardless of whether they're right or wrong or just confused) it allows the usage of the law to change.

So by saying that there is no difference between a so called crime of hatred and a similar crime without the alleged hatred, it makes it ok for the prosecutors to start using out of it's intended context. Then it becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy. A stupid, but well intended law is suddenly accepted as ok to use for anyone, regardless of whether or not they actually should have qualified to be tried for that infraction. Hence, more freedoms taken away. *This isn't intended as an attack on anyone or to show how they are wrong, I'm pointing out the delicate nature of these laws and how they become a catch-22 situation.

Without trying to change subject and start another debate, Another example most have a basic familiarity with was the Patriot Act. The intent was to allow the government to find and stop terrorists. Look where that well intentioned and somewhat temporarily needed law got us. (same basic concept; the groups we were trying to fight actually had some protection from loopholes in the law and the restrictions in place to protect our freedoms)

I don't have a solution to suggest, because the compromises that come up can be bad in the long run. We need a "common sense" type of law, unfortunately as my dad used to say, "a person is smart, people are stupid" and "laws are necessary to protect people from their own stupidity."

Jack

 

[Buckeye_Nut]

That is what they decide.

They decide whether the person is guilty of a hate crime or not.

In europe, it's now considered a hate crime to speak out against liberalism.

 

[jonnythan]

In europe, it's now considered a hate crime to speak out against liberalism.

Which country and which law, specifically, outlaw speaking out against "liberalism"?

 

[zildjian]

Which country and which law, specifically, outlaw speaking out against "liberalism"?

One of those new continental laws... which knows no national boundaries!

 

[highfihoney]

We need a "common sense" type of law,
Jack

Agreed but now days " a common sense law " is an oxymoron,the days of laws being based on common sense are long gone,now we make & amend laws to further special interest groups & lawmakers personal agenda's.

Ever hear the saying that "spock" from Star Trek used while he was dying,the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.

This is not the case anymore,race laws are nothing more than one sided & outdated laws that are kept on the books because not one lawmaker has balls enough to stand up & say "THIS IS WRONG" for fear of the negative media storm, that is historicly proven to follow.

Ive seen alot of laws made & changed in my lifetime,these race laws are not meant for the good of the people.