RACIALLY AGGRAVATED CRIME
What is a racially aggravated crime?
When criminal conduct can be shown to have had a racial motivation it will be considered and may be prosecuted as an alleged crime that has been racially aggravated. Two pieces of legislation were enacted in 1998 that gave this the force of statute law.
The first was section 50A of the Criminal Law (Consolidation) (Scotland) Act 1995. This made the new
offences of racially aggravated harassment and behaviour where the alleged conduct was aggravated by some form of racial malice and ill will.
The second was section 96 of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998. This made a new
aggravation that could be added on to charges stating that the alleged conduct had been aggravated by some form of racial malice and ill will.
Why have racial aggravations?
It is clear from relevant research and from engagement with communities that many victims of racist crime do not report racist crimes to the authorities and when they do they may be reluctant to say that racism appears to have been the motivation behind the crime.
Therefore there is a need to increase trust in the criminal justice system and in the prosecution service. Our prosecution policy on racially aggravated crime is robust to ensure a consistent approach and to reassure victims of racist crime that their complaints will be taken seriously. In many ways this is the most robust of all our prosecution policies but there are good reasons for this, the most important being the need to send a message to Scottish society that racism will not be tolerated whenever it occurs as a crime.
How do the police report racially aggravated crimes?
The Lord Advocate issued guidelines issued to Chief Constables in June 2001 and again in February 2002.
These Guidelines require the police in the investigation of all suspected race crimes to find out from the victim what they think motivated the crime. This must be fully investigated and clearly recorded. There are other things that should also be considered and recorded such as what impact the incident has had on the victim. The Guidelines require the police to bear in mind that victims of racism may be reluctant to express their fears or beliefs including their belief that an incident has been motivated by racism, and that victims reporting racism may often be doing so against a background of previously unreported racism.
How is racially aggravated crime monitored?
Area PFs are responsible for monitoring and send quarterly reports that include analyses of all race cases received in that period to the Legal and Policy Forum via the Diversity Team. The Diversity team has conducted reviews of all police reports received in 3 periods between October 2002 and March 2003. This report (link to report needs added) was published in 2004. The results showed that while the police were complying more often than not, there was still much to be done. As a result, COPFS and ACPOS (the Association of Chief Police Officers in Scotland) developed a questionnaire that covers all aspects of the LA's Guidelines and that is now automatically included in the "antecedents" section of the Special Police Report. This should improve things further. The next monitoring exercise will cover reports received in September, October and November 2004.
How many racially aggravated crimes are reported and how often are proceedings taken?In the financial year
1999-2000:
· 540 police reports containing charges under section 50A of the Criminal Law Consolidation (Scotland) Act 1995 were reported.
· Proceedings were taken in respect of 538 of these charges.
· These statistics were published in our 1999-2000 Annual Report (hyperlink needs added).
· At this stage our systems did not allow us to track section 96 aggravations in the way we now can.
In
2000-2001:
· 972 charges of section 50A were reported by the police to Procurators Fiscal.
· Proceedings were taken in 916 cases (94.2%).
· Due to developing systems we were not able to track all Section 96 aggravations but at least 143 were reported and proceedings taken in 131 cases (91.6%).
· These figures were published in the Annual Report (hyperlink needs added).
In
2001-2002:
· 1315 charges were received from the police. This figure included both section 50A charges and section 96 aggravations.
· Proceedings which included either a statutory charge or aggravation were taken by Procurators Fiscal in 95% of these cases.
· Due to continuing improvements in our office IT systems during the reporting year, we became able for the first time to track all cases which included section 96 aggravations.
In 2002-2003:
· 2038 s.50A charges of racially aggravated harassment and behaviour and 787 charges with s.96 aggravations were reported to PFs.
· Proceedings were taken in 1909 section 50A charges (93.6%) and in 738 section 96 aggravations (93.6%).
· At the time of these figures being compiled there were 20 section 50A charges (0.98%%) and 7 section 96 aggravations (0.88%) where a decision was still pending.
The 2003/2004 figures are still being put together but the basic figures are that there were 2420 s.50A charges, and 994 charges with s.96 aggravations received from the police. More details will follow.
How are the general public being made aware of the new offence?
PFs are complying with policy and explaining it to local communities in the course of the work of their Area resource teams on race matters - to attempt to increase confidence and erode the under-reporting of racist crime. Further community engagement will take place over the life of our Race Equality Action Plan (hyperlink needs added) with regular networking and community consultation events. The Area teams send in reports every three months outlining the work they are doing with their local communities.