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Originally Posted by litAKAtor
I do not practice criminal law, but my understanding of hate crime legislation (in Florida) is it imparts more severe punishment on crimes that are committed based on race, gender, national origin and sexuality.
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That's exactly what aggravating factors do as well.
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If you kill someone, it may enhance the punishment if you didn't intend to kill the person to an intentional crime if the government can establish that the crime was done based on a person's protected status.
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Not unlike the felony murder rule. If you manage to kill someone while in the commission of another felony, say robbery, you can be charged with murder even if the other elements of murder (such as intent) are not present.
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Originally Posted by DSTCHAOS
The purpose behind hate crime legislation is to achieve formal legal guidelines for the aggravating and mitigating factors as they pertain to group membership. As opposed to relying on judicial and presecutorial discretion.
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Aggravating factors are set by statute, just like definitions of crimes are.
Understand, I have no problem with the motivation and goal behind hate crime legislation. In some ways, it's a semantics thing. Where "hate crime" means "sentencing enhancement," I'm all for it. But in those instances where the classification of "hate crime" is proposed as essentially a separate chargeable offense, that's when I have a problem.
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