Bias Motivation
Definition
The offender's prejudice against a victim's actual or perceived group membership that drives the selection of that victim or target, proven as a fact separate from the underlying criminal act.
Related terms
- Mission Offender
- In the Levin and McDevitt typology, the rarest and most dangerous offender type, who treats bigotry as a life purpose and plans...
- Thrill Offender
- In the Levin and McDevitt typology, an offender who attacks for excitement or peer status, usually in a group, with little planning...
- Aggravated Offence Statute
- A law, used in England and Wales, that creates a separate, more heavily punishable offence when racial or religious hostility is demonstrated...
- Hate Crime Enhancement
- A sentencing add-on, distinct from the underlying offence, applied when a crime is proven to be motivated by bias against the victim's...
- Levin and McDevitt Typology
- A four-type classification of bias offenders, thrill, defensive, retaliatory and mission, built from Boston Police Department case files studied by Jack Levin...
- Message Crime
- Barbara Perry's framing of hate crime as an act aimed at intimidating an entire community sharing the victim's characteristic, not only the...
- Parasitic Offence
- A hate crime's legal structure: a bias element layered onto an existing base offence, such as assault or criminal damage, rather than...
- Penalty-Enhancement Statute
- A law, typical of most United States jurisdictions, that keeps the base offence unchanged but increases the available sentence once bias motivation...
- Protected Characteristic
- A victim attribute, such as race, religion, sexual orientation or disability, that a hate-crime statute names as a ground for bias motivation.
Explained in these topics
- Hate Crime and Bias-Motivated Offending
- Hate Crimes: Modern Crime Typology (Unit I)The offender's prejudice against a victim's actual or perceived group membership that drives victim selection, proven as a fact separate from the underlying cr...