Hate-law amendment repeal leaves 'most vulnerable' unprotected

Supremacists of all colors typically have one thing in common - their hate goes beyond race.

Whether their rancor is rooted in religion or something else, they often spew as much homophobic and anti-Semitic sentiment as racist rhetoric.

But the gay community lost one level of protection last summer, when the state's highest court repealed part of the state's hate-crimes law on a technicality.

The Pennsylvania Ethnic Intimidation and Institutional Vandalism Act, enacted in 1982, made it a crime to victimize someone because of their race, color, religion or national origin.

In 2002, lawmakers amended the law to add protections on the basis of sexual orientation, gender identity, ancestry, gender and mental or physical disability.

But the state Supreme Court in July repealed the amendment.

The legislation, they reasoned, was introduced as an agricultural crop-destruction bill and later gutted and rewritten to include the hate-crimes provisions. While bills occasionally pass looking nothing like how they were initially introduced, the justices in this case decided that the additional protections violated the original intent of the bill, thereby making it unconstitutional.

That means that while the groups specified in the original 1982 bill, including Jews, remain protected, those specified in the 2002 amendment are no longer protected.

"That leaves the most vulnerable people in Pennsylvania unprotected by the state hate-crimes law," said Jake Kaskey, policy and outreach coordinator of Equality Advocates Pennsylvania, an advocacy group for the state's lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community.

The lost protections came at a time when Kaskey's group has seen a 28 percent rise in homophobic hate incidents reported to its hotline since 2001, he added.

Several lawmakers have introduced a new bill to add the provisions back in.

But in the meantime, people like Danielle, who asked that her last name not be used because she fears her attacker, suffer.

Danielle was walking hand-in-hand with her partner near Rittenhouse Square in 2006 when a woman on a bicycle approached, shouting obscenities and threatening to kill them.

"We at first just thought it was a crazy person," said Danielle, 30, of Center City. "But it became quite clear quite quickly why she approached us."

The woman, shouting homophobic slurs, punched Danielle in the head and continued trying to beat her as Danielle and her partner sought refuge in a nearby church. The woman then fled on her bike, but police with a warrant arrested her earlier this year, and the case went to trial this summer.

But by then, the hate-crime amendment had been overturned.

"So they just charged her with a misdemeanor simple assault - that just obfuscated the real nature of the crime," Danielle said. "The really terrible part is that this woman is a social worker. She provides assistance to people in the community, but this is not on her record as a hate crime."

Danielle doesn't know if her attacker belonged to an organized hate group.

But some experts say that citizens should be more concerned about the hidden haters lurking next-door, rather than those aligned with organized groups.

"Becoming hysterical [about organized groups] takes attention away from the bigotry and prejudice that lies elsewhere: Most hate crimes are committed by people who are not members of hate groups," the Anti-Defamation League's Barry Morrison said. "Your next-door neighbor or the kid in your classroom with misinformed ideas are much more numerous and require more attention."

Anthony Griggs, a research analyst who specializes in skinheads, agreed: "Nobody knew who Timothy McVeigh was until he blew up the Oklahoma federal building. He was not a member of any particular group, but he was influenced by them." *