Asian Americans Remain Vigilant Against Hate Crimes

On July 1, 2007, Satendar Singh, a 26-year-old Fijian man of Indian descent, was picnicking by a lake with his friends when he was beaten to death in what witnesses say was an ugly racial hate crime. Singh’s friends said that “a group of Russian-speaking men and women had directed homophobic slurs at Singh, and racial insults at his group before the physical attack,” according to a report in The Sacramento Bee.

No one else was injured in Singh’s group. Singh’s family members and doctors decided to end life support after four days. Singh is one of the latest victims in the growing number of hate crimes against Asian Americans.

According to a report by The Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program, on a national level, 46.3 percent of 11,430 offenses that occurred within the single-bias incidents were motivated by racial bias in 2001. Investigators determined 6.6 percent out of the 46.3 percent (5,290) offenses reflected an anti-Asian or anti-Pacific Islander bias.

In the post-Sept. 11 climate, experts say that Asian Americans are even more at risk of being victims of hate crimes.

In a nationwide Hate Crime Statistics Act study done by the FBI in 2001, the known hate crime offenses against Asian/Pacific Islanders were 349 compared to 317 in 2000. The number of victims in 2000 was 339 in comparison to 363 in 2001. The data on the report in 2001 was gathered post-Sept. 11.

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