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Scale of disability hate crime revealed
Monday 12 September 2011
Mencap supports EHRC’s call for action on disability-related harassment
The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) has published the results of its inquiry into disability-related harassment.
The inquiry specifically addressed ten cases, including Steven Hoskin, who was tortured and died when he was forced off a viaduct, and Keith Philpott, who was brutally murdered in his home.
It also addressed wider issues around recording, reporting and responding to hate crime.
New figures released in September showed that disability hate crimes rose by more than a fifth in 2010. Across England, Wales and Northern Ireland, police recorded 1,569 incidents in which the victim thought the alleged crime was motivated by their disability, compared with just 1,294 in 2009.
However, many hate crimes remain unrecorded. Mike Smith, lead commissioner for the EHRC’s inquiry, said: “For me, two things come out of this inquiry… The first is just how much harassment seems to be going on… The second is that no one knows about it.”
Recommendations for change
The EHRC makes a number of specific recommendations for addressing hate crime. For example, it says that the government should commission research on disability-related harassment to help fill knowledge gaps. And it should change sentencing guidelines to treat all identity-based hate crime murders equally.
Recommendations for the police include that a named officer should provide victims and witnesses with acknowledgement of their incident in an accessible format, including contact details and advice on what to do if further incidents occur.
Within the court system, the EHRC says that comprehensive monitoring systems should be introduced to identify whether victims of crime are disabled and whether hostility or prejudice to disability was a motivation in the crime.
Mencap's head of campaigns and policy, David Congdon, said: Public authorities need to step up to tackle this terrible scourge, or end up condemning hundreds of thousands of disabled people to years of violence, harassment and abuse. If such crimes are to be prevented and justice achieved for victims, it is essential that these authorities act on the recommendations in the report.
The EHRC says it will progress the recommendations in partnership with the other agencies and organisations involved. However, the report also concludes that hate crime is a social problem. 'Everyone should be aware that disability-related harassment is predominantly a social problem and one that, in the final analysis, also requires an individual response and commitment to change.'
Gemma Hayter's killers sentenced
The EHRC's report was published on the same day that the killers of Gemma Hayter were sentenced.
Gemma, a young woman with a learning disability, was viciously beaten and left to die in Warwickshire last year.
Three people were jailed for life and two others were given 13 and 15 years for manslaughter at the sentencing at the Old Bailey, London.
Gemma had considered all five to be her friends.
Read the report on the EHRC website
Find out more about Mencap’s campaign against hate crime, Stand by me
Comments
People do this to them because they think they can mess with disabled people - how society treats them REALLY disgusts me because I'm a person with autism and learning disabilities. Haters do this to us because we are seen as not knowing how to report crimes so abusers take this for granted to get away with hate crime and giving us abuse that we don't deserve - same reason why people are cruel to animals because "We're easy targets"
To catch criminals out, I think disabled housing should have hidden police CCTV cameras inside their homes and around their areas without the criminals knowledge as one of the ways to reduce disability hate crime whether disabled people live with someone or not as hate crime on disabled people is inevitable.
I am nearly 42 yrs of age I faced bullying, rape and sexual abuse as a child in school from different male pubils younger and older than me, this also happened through my adulthood from the age of 7 to 33 years old. It's only been the last couple of years or so that I have had any counciling. From the age of 7 to 12 I was in boarding school, Sunday night to Friday and went for the weekend and came back Sunday other than school holidays. I stuffer from behavior problems, they got worse the more I had to go to school because I found very hard to explained to adults what was going on to make me so unhappy. When I moved to another school at the age of 12 I hoped it didn't happen again but it did by the time I was 14. I moved school to spent my last school happen by another pubil when I was 15 to 16. I was also a victim of bullying too at every school I went to. Please don't this happen to anyone, at any age no matter who they are or what they are like.
One boy who abused me and other children in the boarding school I went to he's now in prison for killing his wife and family in a fire. Please read my website on sararevealed.blogspot.com/ to learn more. I am not a centre of attenstion I just want the world to be awareness of the things that happen and have happen for too many years with very little awareness.
I have found in my 10yr battle with EVERYONE because of my son's disabilities that the public are not just to blame for the inhumane things that go on to people that are 'different'. My son has experienced bullying from his teachers AND Headmaster repeatedly. The Police have had no time to question my son and so have blamed HIM for bullying others making him scared of the Police, due to Malicious neighbours called the police about my son - aged 11yrs, my son saw a police car and ran home, the officer when came to question him said to me that he had never known of an innocent person run away from a police car and when and when I tried to defend my son my sopn and |I were threatened with being arrested, a few hrs later I received a call from the police stating the matter would be going no further due to a witness stating my son was NOT involved in anything innappropriate, no apologies to my son. Social Services are the bigger bullies.
Bullying people is wrong, bullying people who are different is barbaric and cowardly and that should be said for family members, neighbours, people out in the street, public services, it is happening everywhere and not just with 'joe' public either and as a parent with a child of many disabilities, I will say there is no help anywhere but with more awareness this could possibly change but this will take a hell of a long time.
The punishment for the ones that get caught is far too 'nice', prison with all its mod cons, protection for others, slapped wrists and moving to a different department, wow that's justice, where's the justice for the VICTIMS, there isn't any!