AUDIT OF VIOLENCE AGAINST ASIAN PACIFIC AMERICANS

ANTI-ASIAN VIOLENCE / A NATIONAL PROBLEM

First Annual Report of the
National Asian Pacific American Legal Consortium
1629 K Street, NW, suite 1010
Washington, D.C., 20006

April 1994

Compiled and written with the assistance of: the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund the Asian Pacific American Legal Center of Southern California the Asian Law Caucus, Inc.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

1. This is the first comprehensive, nationwide, non-governmental attempt to collect and assess the extent of anti-Asian violence.
2. While data has been difficult to obtain, incomplete when available, and limited by widespread underreporting, it nonetheless clearly establishes that the problem is extensive and severe.
3. There were 335 reported anti-Asian incidents in 1993, or one incident almost every day. The total of 335 includes 153 incidents with demonstrable anti-Asian motivation ("animus") and 182 incidents where this animus was suspected.
4. At least thirty (30) Asian Pacific Americans died in 1993 as a result of homicides in which racial animus was suspected or proven. Twenty six (26) of these, or eighty-seven percent (87%) had to be classified as "suspected" rather than as "proven" hate crimes in this Audit, however, because of inadequate investigation by local authorities or lack of corroborating evidence. Nevertheless, the deaths had a profound impact on the Asian Pacific American community, and the locations in which they occured are being monitored by the National Asian Pacific American Legal Consortium ("the Consortium") and other groups.
5. Among the incidents where there was demonstrable anti-Asian animus, assault (a total of 31, or 20% of incidents), vandalism (26 or 17%) and threat or intimidation (14 or 9%) were reported most commonly. In cases where anti-Asian animus was suspected but not proved, aggravated assault (33 or 18%), robbery (32 or 18%), assault (30 or 17%), and homicide (26 or 14%) topped the list. (See Chart 1 in the Audit).

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), using statistics for 1992 (the most recent year available), states that the most frequently-reported anti-Asian crime is intimidation (37% of incidents), in contrast to our finding that assault and vandalism are most common.

6. Asian Pacific Americans are most vulnerable where they reside (43 or 28% of incidents), with commercial business sites (16 or 10%) also being dangerous places. (See Chart 10). Small businesses also appear to be vulnerable locations. Statistics from Los Angeles show fourteen homicides, eight aggravated assaults, and numerous other incidents in which racial animus is strongly suspected, though it is difficult to prove. Anecdotal evidence indicates comparable levels of violence in other parts of the country. (See Charts 8 and 9).
7. While only 12 claims of police misconduct and 14 suspected incidents in 1993 involved law enforcement officers, 92% (24 of 26) happened in New York City. Community distrust of and dissatisfaction with police response and reporting practices continues to hinder unified efforts to combat anti-Asian violence. Follow-up investigations by Consortium staff indicate widespread police insensitivity or inaction when victims have reported hate crimes. There were a number of instances in which the victim felt that law enforcement officers either did not care about the hate crime or treated the victim so poorly that they would not report a similar incident in the future.
8. Anti-Asian violence is widely underreported. The reasons for this underreporting include:

a. Communication barriers between victims and police, and the lack of bilingual law enforcement personnel

b. Mistrust of the police by victims, caused in part by incidents in this country and in part by negative experiences with law enforcement officers in countries of origin

c. Ignorance by victims of hate crime laws or other civil rights protections

d. Non-identification or mis-identification of hate crimes by law enforcement officers, sometimes done deliberately to avoid an intensified investigation.

9. As of January 1994, most jurisdictions had statistics for only the first three months of 1993. Therefore, the majority of incident reports were collected in New York, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. Limited data also was available from Arizona, Connecticut, Florida, Idaho, Maryland, Montana, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Oregon, Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming, for a total of fourteen states. Overall, most states do not collect anti-Asian hate crime data with enough specificity to allow thoughtful analysis of trends or issues.
10. Factors that contribute to anti-Asian violence include:

a. Increases in Asian Pacific American population, amid a widespread perception of limited national resources

b. An ongoing economic recession that intensifies economic competition between racial and ethnic groups

c. Decreases in social services attributable to the recessionary economy but blamed on recent immigrants

d. Abrupt racial integration of neighborhoods and schools, leading to "move-in" violence

e. Deep-seated racial hatred, exacerbated by organized hate group activities and scapegoating by politicians

f. Insensitive media coverage of minority groups and issues, leading to the perpetuation of stereotypes, instead of the recognition that Asian Pacific Americans are just as American as their neightbors

g. Poor police response to hate crimes, and

h. Scapegoating immigrants for foreign policy disputes between the United States and their countries of origin

11. Summary of Recommendations:

a. Hate crimes should be swiftly and completely condemned by political, religious, business, community, and education leaders

b. All suspected hate crimes should be thoroughly investigated

c. All federal, state, and local agencies charged with the collection of hate crime statistics under the Federal Hate Crimes Statistics Act and similar local laws should collect those statistics promptly and completely, with the threat of economic disincentives for noncomplying jurisdictions.

d. More funding should be given to the Justice Department's Community Relations Service and other efforts to bring communities together before explosive incidents result in injuries and property damage

e. Greater attention on all levels of government should be paid to increasing economic redevelopment in our impoverished inner cities

f. The Federal Hate Crimes Statistics Act should be reauthorized and funded, and the Penalty Enhancement Act and Bias Crimes Compensation Act should be passed and funded

g. State statutes and regulations to address issues of data collection, civil rights protections, and penalty enhancement for bias crimes should be passed and enforced

h. Multicultural communication, collaboration, and dispute-resolution training for judges, lawyers, caseworkers, and others involved in the legal system should be implemented with dispatch in every court system

i. More Asian-language interpreters should be hired in courts and police stations located near Asian Pacific American communities

j. Ethnically and linguistically diverse police officers on federal, state, and local levels should be recruited, screened, and given multicultural communication, collaboration, and dispute-resolution training

k. Independent prosecutors should be appointed when local prosecutors are not adequately addressing suspected anti-Asian animus

l. Specialized hate crime units for prosecutor and law enforcement offices should be established where appropriate

m. Civilian review boards to oversee police misconduct cases should be created and given adequate funding

n. Community policing should be encouraged and funded

o. Asian Pacific American victims should be more vigilant about identifying and reporting hate crimes

p. Finally, and most importantly, education efforts among youth should be encouraged and funded, so that multicultural communication, collaboration, and dispute-resolution skills can be taught in schools and other appropriate settings

The National Asian Pacific American Legal Consortium ("the Consortium") is a not-for-profit, nonpartisan organization whose mission is to advance the legal and civil rights of the nation's 7.3 million Asian Pacific Americans through litigation, advocacy, public education, and public policy development. Its present program priorities include anti-Asian violence, voting rights and immigration. Its founding organizations, which provided assistance in researching and writing this Audit, are the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund in New York, the Asian Law Caucus in San Francisco, and the Asian Pacific American Legal Center of Southern California in Los Angeles.

This audit was made possible through the generosity of Anheuser-Busch Companies, Inc., the AT&T Foundation, Carnegie Corporation of New York, the Ford Foundation, Levi Strauss and Company, Philip Morris Companies, Inc., the Rockefeller Foundation, and many individual contributors.

For information, contact Phil Tajitsu Nash, Executive Director, National Asian Pacific American Legal Consortium, 1629 K Street, NW, suite 1010, Washington, D.C. 20006; 202-296-2300 (Phone); 202-296-2318 (Fax).