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Thrill Offender

Definition

In the Levin and McDevitt typology, an offender who attacks for excitement or peer status, usually in a group, with little planning and no personal grievance against the victim.

Related terms

Bias Motivation
The offender's prejudice against a victim's actual or perceived group membership that drives the selection of that victim or target, proven as...
Mission Offender
In the Levin and McDevitt typology, the rarest and most dangerous offender type, who treats bigotry as a life purpose and plans...
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.

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