Hate Crime Bill Passes Final Committee, Heads to the Governor’s Desk

By Greg DeGiere, Civil Rights Advocate, The Arc / UCP California Collaboration

After three years of effort, it looks almost certain now that California will soon require all its law enforcement officers to follow strict protocols to recognize, report and respond to hate crimes – with particular attention to anti-disability crimes, also known as the invisible hate crimes.

Last week, the Senate Appropriations Committee passed AB 449 by Assemblymember Phil Ting with a 7-0 vote.  AB 449 is sponsored by a diverse coalition of civil rights and community groups led by The Arc / UCP California Collaboration and the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC). Passage by the full Legislature now looks assured, leaving Governor Gavin Newsom as the final hurdle. While it’s likely he will sign the bill into law, we can’t be 100% sure and will need to make the case to him.

The bill has never received a “no” vote in any committee during its legislative journey.

If signed by the Governor, the bill will require every local and state law enforcement agency in California to adopt a formal policy guiding officers on how to respond to hate crimes. The deadline for them to adopt the policy will be July 1, 2024.

Equally importantly, it will require all law enforcement agencies to submit their policies to the state Department of Justice to be checked for compliance with legal requirements that the Legislature enacted with this bill and earlier bills that we also sponsored.

Among those required elements of the policy are:

    • In recognizing suspected disability-bias hate crimes, the policy shall instruct officers to consider whether there is any indication that the perpetrator was motivated by hostility or other bias, occasioned by factors such as, but not limited to, dislike of persons who arouse fear or guilt, a perception that persons with disabilities are inferior and therefore ‘deserving victims,’ a fear of persons whose visible traits are perceived as being disturbing to others, or resentment of those who need, demand, or receive alternative educational, physical, or social accommodations.
    • In recognizing suspected disability-bias hate crimes, the policy also shall instruct officers to consider whether there is any indication that the perpetrator perceived the victim to be vulnerable and, if so, if this perception is grounded, in whole or in part, in anti-disability bias. This includes, but is not limited to, if a perpetrator targets a person with a particular perceived disability while avoiding other vulnerable-appearing persons such as inebriated persons or persons with perceived disabilities different than those of the victim, those circumstances could be evidence that the perpetrator’s motivations included bias against persons with the perceived disability of the victim and that the crime must be reported as a suspected hate crime and not a mere crime of opportunity.”

The Arc’s recent, intense advocacy work to protect children and adults with disabilities dates back to our sponsorship of the first Crime Victims with Disability Act bill, AB 2038 by Assemblymember Salley Lieber, in 2008 and then SB 110 by Senator Carol Lou in 2009.

It continued through a series of bills making incremental progress, culminating with AB 1985 by Assemblymember Ting of 2018, which we co-sponsored with Equality California. Efforts by the coalition we lead resulted in a 2018 report by State Auditor: Hate Crime in California Law Enforcement Has Not Adequately Identified, Reported, or Responded to Hate Crimes , which laid the groundwork for our efforts for the last three years leading to AB 449.

The coalition members sponsoring AB 449 included:

    • The Arc & United Cerebral Palsy California Collaboration
    • California League of United Latin American Citizens LULAC
    • California Asian Pacific American Bar Association
    • California Hawaii State Conference of the NAACP
    • Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism
    • Asian Law Alliance
    • Japanese American Citizens League
    • California Association of Human Relations Organizations
    • California Council of Churches IMPACT
    • Feminist Majority
    • Sikh Coalition
    • California Alliance for Retired Americans
    • Hindu American Foundation

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