Just for the sake of argument, there are or used to be a person/people that you could go to in the neighborhood that would get you justice outside of law enforcement.

Your cost of this justice is the defense atty's fee to get the criminal found innocent.

I'm not standing up for the thugs or anything. I think the key should be thrown away. In California for it to be a hate crime there has to be some evidence that there was hate involved. This could be someone hearing the thugs using racial slurs while beating the guy up, leaving a message of some kind showing hate, etc. Without specific evidence the prosecutor can't prove it, and won't charge it. It doesn't mean it wasn't a hate crime, it's just that there wasn't any evidence it was.

uhmmm .. .. so then it was just an absolutle lack of repsect-crime?

yeah, that's not nearly as bad as when the crime is commited out of hate. :rolleyes:

Sub-catagorizing crimes must be great for the lawyers.

What next? . . court argument over whether it was a jelousy/hate-crime, or an envy/hate-crime, or an envy/spite-crime?

--It's serioulsy stupid to entertain the minutia of bad behavior. As it doesn't help curb the stupid-crime, criminal behavior.

On the topic of whether we should treat "hate crime" differently, do you see any difference between:

1. Spray-painting a gang tag on a fence
2. Spray-painting "BURN THE JEWS" on a synagogue
3. Spray-painting "KILL THE NIGGERS" on a black church
4. Spray-painting "KILL ALL WHITES" on a white church
5. Spray-painting "DEATH TO HOMOS" on a gay club

If you understand that #2-3-4 affect the community (and especially the jews, blacks, whites and gays) more than the common vandalism of #1, then you can see one argument for treating hate crimes differently.

Given that almost everyone on this OT board is white, male, hetero, and nominally Christian, I can see that it might be hard to grasp this.

but he's still an asshat