Blog #2 Hate Crimes

My second blog is about hate crimes in Pennsylvania, the following are the answers to the questions you asked.

1. The population covered for hate crimes in Pennsylvania was 12,565,359 and the total number of incidents reported was 53.

2. The crimes covered under Pennsylvania state law are bias-motivated violence and intimidation, civil action, race, religion, ethnicity, institutional vandalism and data collection. It does not cover sexual orientation, gender, disability, "other" and training for law enforcement personnel.

3. Pennsylvania covers crime penalty/enhancement which they define as: A person commits the offense of ethnic intimidation if, with malicious intention toward the race, color, religion or national origin of another individual or group of individuals, he commits an offense under any other provision of this article or under Chapter 33 (relating to arson, criminal mischief and other property destruction) exclusive of section 3307 (relating to institutional vandalism) or under section 3503 (relating to criminal trespass) with respect to such individual or his or her property or with respect to one or more members of such group or to their property. an offense under this section shall be classified one degree higher in the classification specified in section 106 (relating to classes of offenses) than the classification of the other offense. Pennsylvania also covers institutional vandalism which they define as: A person commits the offense of institutional vandalism if he knowingly desecrates, vandalizes, defaces or otherwise damages: (1) any church, synagogue or other facility or place used for religious worship or other religious purposes; (2) any cemetery, mortuary or other facility used for the purpose of burial or memorializing the dead; (3) any school, educational facility, community center, municipal building, courthouse facility, State or local government building or vehicle or juvenile detention center; (4) the grounds adjacent to and owned or occupied by any facility set forth in paragraph (1), (2) or (3); or (5) any personal property located in any facility set forth in this subsection. A person commits a misdemeanor of the second degree if he intentionally desecrates any public monument or structure, or place of worship or burial. The state also covers data collection which they define as: The Pennsylvania State Police shall have the power and its duty shall be to collect information relating to crimes and incidents related to the race, color, religion or national origin of individuals or groups, which shall be reported monthly by all local law enforcement agencies and the State Fire Marshal. But Pennsylvania does not cover Law Enforcement training.

5. Back in February of 2011, two Pennsylvania men were convicted of a hate crime and sentenced to 9 years in prison.  Derrick Donchak and Brandon Piekarsky were found guilty in federal court for several crimes including hate crimes on Luis Ramirez. They were acquitted of the murder charge, but found guilty on the simple assault. According to witnesses, the fight started because the two defendants did not want "immigrants" in their neighborhood and began to attacked Luis Ramirez while using racial slurs. The beat Luis Ramirez so badly that he was on life support and then died two days after the attack.  Three police officers were also charged in trying to cover up the crime and falsifying police reports. All three were found not guilty of conspiracy to obstruct a federal investigation, but one of the officers was found guilty of falsifying police reports and the other officer was found guilty of lying to the FBI.
http://articles.cnn.com/2011-02-23/justice/pennsylvania.hate.crime_1_derrick-donchak-brandon-piekarsky-federal-court?_s=PM:CRIME

6. Two movies about hate crimes that instantly come to my mind would be Boys don't cry and American History X. Boys don't cry stars Hilary Swank and is a real life story about a woman who dresses and acts like a boy and is beaten, raped and murdered by male acquaintances once they find out that find out that he is actually a female. The second movie is American History X which is about two brothers whose father is a firefighter and is killed by a black gang member while he is trying to put out a fire. The oldest brother is a neo-nazi and brutally kills two black gang members when he catches them trying to break into his truck that his father gave to him.  He gets sent to prison and his views change and he tries to teach his brother to not go down the same path he went down. I don't have links for this question, because I have seen both films so I already knew what they were about :)