Advocates warn of possible underreporting in FBI hate crime data

An annual FBI report released last month showed there were seven hate crime offenses last year motivated by religious bias against Sikhs. But critics of the report say the data can be unreliable because it depends on law enforcement voluntarily reporting hate crime figures to the FBI.

“FBI hate crime data represents the tip of the iceberg and understates the magnitude of hate crime in America,” said Sim J. Singh, national advocacy manager of The Sikh Coalition, a nonprofit. “The only way to bridge the data gap is for law enforcement agencies to adopt mandatory hate crime reporting.”

Figures from the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting Program for 2016 said those seven offenses represented a mere 0.5 percent of 1,538 reported across all religions. The previous year saw six hate crime offenses against Sikhs, out of an overall 1,354.

For Subscribers

FOR SUBSCRIBERSAfter surviving a botched lethal injection, Christa Pike faces unprecedented legal battle

FOR SUBSCRIBERSHunger in a land of plenty: Major food banks face ‘heartbreaking’ need, NBC News survey finds

FOR SUBSCRIBERSInflation and tariffs push U.S. holiday spending projections to a record $1.7 trillion

FOR SUBSCRIBERSWhat happened inside the room where officials tried to execute Christa Pike by lethal injection

FOR SUBSCRIBERSHow we reported the saga of the CIA officer and his gold-bar stash

FOR SUBSCRIBERS‘We’re going to beat you to death with audits’: Brad Raffensperger gears up to oversee his final election in Georgia

FOR SUBSCRIBERSDiddy is punished following NBC News report on his VIP life in prison and contraband cellphone use

FOR SUBSCRIBERS‘Too young to vote, old enough to be tear gassed’: French protesters’ anger swells

FOR SUBSCRIBERSDOJ gets aggressive in suing states that challenge Trump’s immigration policies

FOR SUBSCRIBERSJustice Department seeks criminal charge for former Trump aide Cassidy Hutchinson

FOR SUBSCRIBERS‘I just want to hold him’: USS Lincoln sailor to meet his 10-month-old son as ship docks

FOR SUBSCRIBERSSenate candidates run on raising Social Security taxes for higher incomes to prevent benefit cuts

FOR SUBSCRIBERSRussian operation that used ChatGPT tricked schools, a politician and media, OpenAI says

FOR SUBSCRIBERSTrump administration’s deal with Nevada fuels data center fight in governor’s race

FOR SUBSCRIBERSLatino voters reject Trump’s immigration policies — and detail the personal impact

Slide 1 of 1

For Subscribers

FOR SUBSCRIBERSAfter surviving a botched lethal injection, Christa Pike faces unprecedented legal battle

FOR SUBSCRIBERSHunger in a land of plenty: Major food banks face ‘heartbreaking’ need, NBC News survey finds

FOR SUBSCRIBERSInflation and tariffs push U.S. holiday spending projections to a record $1.7 trillion

FOR SUBSCRIBERSWhat happened inside the room where officials tried to execute Christa Pike by lethal injection

FOR SUBSCRIBERSHow we reported the saga of the CIA officer and his gold-bar stash

FOR SUBSCRIBERS‘We’re going to beat you to death with audits’: Brad Raffensperger gears up to oversee his final election in Georgia

FOR SUBSCRIBERSDiddy is punished following NBC News report on his VIP life in prison and contraband cellphone use

FOR SUBSCRIBERS‘Too young to vote, old enough to be tear gassed’: French protesters’ anger swells

FOR SUBSCRIBERSDOJ gets aggressive in suing states that challenge Trump’s immigration policies

FOR SUBSCRIBERSJustice Department seeks criminal charge for former Trump aide Cassidy Hutchinson

FOR SUBSCRIBERS‘I just want to hold him’: USS Lincoln sailor to meet his 10-month-old son as ship docks

FOR SUBSCRIBERSSenate candidates run on raising Social Security taxes for higher incomes to prevent benefit cuts

FOR SUBSCRIBERSRussian operation that used ChatGPT tricked schools, a politician and media, OpenAI says

FOR SUBSCRIBERSTrump administration’s deal with Nevada fuels data center fight in governor’s race

FOR SUBSCRIBERSLatino voters reject Trump’s immigration policies — and detail the personal impact

Slide 1 of 1

While the FBI’s 2016 hate crime report included participants from 15,254 law enforcement agencies, only 12 percent of them (1,776) reported one or more incidents, the agency said in a news release.

The rest reported no hate crimes occurring within their jurisdictions.

“We know there are multiple jurisdictions year-in and year-out that don’t report or report zero hate crimes to the FBI,” said Marita Etcubanez, director of strategic initiatives for Asian Americans Advancing Justice-AAJC, a civil rights nonprofit.

An FBI spokesperson said in an email that it does not comment on or provide analysis of statistics in the report.

The bureau's figures showed a roughly 5 percent increase in hate crime incidents for 2016, compared to the year before, rising from 5,850 to 6,121.

But a Bureau of Justice Statistics survey in June said that on average each year between 2004 and 2015, there were 250,000 hate crime victimizations, defined as a single victim or household that experienced a criminal incident believed to be motivated by hate.

It also found that 54 percent of hate crime victimizations were not reported to police between 2011 and 2015. The most common reason was that they were handled another way, such as privately or through a non-law enforcement official.

Related

news

newsSikh Americans Launch Ad Campaign That Looks to Push Back on Hate

The two reports differ in that the Bureau of Justice Statistics’ National Crime Victimization Survey includes hate crimes both reported and unreported to police.

The Sikh Coalition said in November that it received legal intakes in 2016 from 15 Sikhs who believed they were targeted in hate incidents. From the beginning of this year, they’ve logged 13.

Singh said Sikhs remain hundreds of times more likely to experience hate crimes than the average American.

Their appearance has made them a target of bias incidents and attacks, as religious articles like the turban have wrongly been linked with media images of terrorists following the Sept. 11 attacks, according to the coalition.

“If law enforcement agencies fail to document the true extent of hate crimes against our communities, our nation will have a hard time mobilizing the political will and resources necessary to prevent and combat the problem,” Singh said.

Follow NBC Asian America on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Tumblr.