983848

research-article2020
CJBXXX10.1177/0093854820983848Criminal Justice and BehaviorMalcom, Lantz / Hate Crimes and Weapon Use

Hate Crime Victimization and Weapon

Use

Zachary T. Malcom
Brendan Lantz*
Florida State University

Prior research has suggested that hate crimes hurt more, in that they are more physically severe than other crimes. A separate
body of research has focused on the role of weapons in exacerbating violence; yet, no research has considered the role of
weapon use in bias crime victimization. Following this, this research examines the relationship between weapon use, bias
motivation, and victimization in the United States. On one hand, weapons may play an important role in hate crime by exac-
erbating violence. On the other hand, weapons may be unnecessary for facilitating hate crime violence, given the animus
associated with bias motivation. Using data from the National Incident-Based Reporting System, we find that bias crimes are
both (a) less likely than nonbias crimes to involve weapons and (b) more likely than nonbias crimes to involve serious or
lethal victim injury. These patterns are particularly pronounced for antisexual orientation hate crimes.

Keywords: hate crime; bias crime; violence; victimization; weapon use

A number of scholars have argued that hate crimes, which are crimes motivated by bias
toward the characteristics of the victim (i.e., race, religion, sex, sexual orientation, dis-
ability, etc.), are more severe than other crimes; in other words, hate crimes “hurt more”
(Iganski, 2001; Lantz & Kim, 2019). In general, scholars have pointed to three ways in
which hate crimes hurt more than other crimes. First, hate crimes have a more significant
impact on the community than other crimes. Put another way, hate crimes often function as
a message crime, in that they are intended to convey a threatening message to a victim group,
resulting in a broader community impact (Perry & Alvi, 2012). Second, hate crimes have
more negative psychological and emotional effects on victims than other crimes (Herek
et al., 1997). Finally, research has indicated that hate crimes are more physically severe than
other crimes (Messner et al., 2004; Pezzella & Fetzer, 2017). Masucci and Langton (2017),
for example, found that while approximately 90% of all hate victimizations involved physi-
cal violence (i.e., aggravated assault, simple assault, robbery, rape, or sexual assault), vio-
lence was only present in about 25% of reported nonhate crime victimizations.

*Primary contact.

AUTHORS’ NOTE: The authors would like to thank Beth Huebner, Robert Morgan, Marin Wenger, and
the anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments on this and earlier drafts of this research.
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Brendan Lantz, College of Criminology and
Criminal Justice, Florida State University, 112 S. Copeland Street, Eppes Hall, Tallahassee, FL 32306;
e-mail: blantz@fsu.edu.
CRIMINAL JUSTICE AND BEHAVIOR, 201X, Vol. XX, No. X, Month 2020, 1­–18.
DOI: 10.1177/0093854820983848 ogdr/.oi/p:stht

Article reuse guidelines: sagepub.com/journals-permissions

© 2020 International Association for Correctional and Forensic Psychology

1
2 Criminal Justice and Behavior

One reason that hate crimes are more physically traumatic than other crimes may be that
the animus behind the offense increases the brutality of bias-motivated violence (J. Levin &
McDevitt, 1993). Other research, however, has noted that weapon use plays an important
role in exacerbating the severity of violent victimization by facilitating increased injury and
making violence easier (Wells & Horney, 2002). Indeed, while prior research has largely
neglected to consider the role that weapon use may play in bias crime relative to other
crimes, recent policy conversations seem to imply that weapons—and firearms in particu-
lar—may be colloquially assumed to be an important factor in such violence. More specifi-
cally, recent proposed legislation like the Disarm Hate Act has attempted to enact legislation
that would prohibit individuals who have been convicted of misdemeanor hate crimes from
purchasing or possessing firearms (Stockler, 2019). The legislation has been vocally
opposed by those who argue that the legislation would violate the Second Amendment by
expanding disarmament to misdemeanor conviction. While such legal ramifications and
debates are beyond the scope of the current research, these policy efforts speak to the impor-
tant need to understand what role weapons may play in hate crime violence; extant research,
however, provides little empirical basis on which to structure an informed debate regarding
such policy efforts.
Following this, the present research posits that it is important to consider the role that
weapon use plays in hate crime and victimization. Based on prior research, the current study
posits that hate crime weapon use may function in one of two ways. On one hand, given that
hate crimes are often more physically severe than other crimes, and weapons relate to more
severe physical trauma, it is possible that weapons play an integral role in hate crime sever-
ity. On the other hand, however, it is also possible that weapons are not a necessary compo-
nent for hate-motivated violence, given that hate crimes already involve significant animus
and bias toward the victim, a factor which may itself increase offense brutality. That is,
weapons may play either (a) a substantial role in the increased severity of physical violence
associated with hate crimes or (b) a less significant role in hate crime violence, given a
willingness among those who commit hate crimes to inflict serious violence without the
assistance of a weapon. Yet, despite these differential possibilities, very little research has
explicitly considered the role that weapons play in hate crime violence and victimization,
compared with other violent offending.

Literature Review
Prior research has consistently demonstrated hate crimes to be quantitatively and quali-
tatively more severe (i.e., violent) than other types of nonbias crimes (Harlow, 2005; Lantz
& Kim, 2019; B. Levin, 1999; J. Levin & McDevitt, 1993; Messner et al., 2004; Perry,
2001; Pezzella & Fetzer, 2017; Strom, 2001; Weisburd & Levin, 1993). Strom (2001), for
example, examined National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) data on aggra-
vated assaults and found that 60% of bias crimes resulted in serious injury to the victim.
Harlow (2005) similarly found that 84% of hate crimes in the National Crime Victimization
Survey (NCVS) involved violent offenses while only 23% of nonhate crimes involved a
violent offense, indicating that hate crimes are more than 3 times more likely than nonbias
crimes to involve a violent offense. Likewise, a study by Pezzella and Fetzer (2017) indi-
cated that the odds of severe physical injury in hate-related assaults were 23% greater than
 Malcom, Lantz / Hate Crimes and Weapon Use 3

in nonbias assaults. Perry (2001) also found that victims characterized their injuries as
“fairly serious” or “very serious” in 14% of bias crimes, compared with just 8% of nonbias
crimes. Taken together, hate crimes have consistently been found to be associated with
higher rates of physical violence than nonbias crimes.

Explanations for Increased Physical Trauma

One potential explanation for the increased severity of violence associated with hate
crime may be the bias motivation, or inherent animus, involved in the offense. This animus
may, in turn, translate to increased brutality and more severe physical trauma. J. Levin and
McDevitt (1993), for example, posited that those who commit hate-motivated crime are
more violent than those who commit other crimes because of the hateful views that drive
their offending. Messner and colleagues (2004) also argued that those who engage in hate
crime might have stronger violent and antisocial tendencies than others because they com-
mit violence without victim provocation, producing excessively brutal outcomes. Other
research has noted the role that group threat might play in hate crime offending (Blalock,
1967; Blumer, 1958). In this vein, Perry (2001) argued that the purpose of hate crimes was
to “do difference” and subordinate and intimidate a victim, a motivation that may also sug-
gest increased brutality. In this context, hate-motivated violence reflects power dynamics
within a society, wherein the dominant group seeks to preserve their privileged position by
targeting the more vulnerable groups through hate crime victimization. In other words, hate
crimes function to punish victims for their identity (Perry, 2001). Hate crimes are thus the
extension of cultural values of domination and subordination, which may extend to increased
physical domination during an offense. Prior research has, for example, found that when
individuals view themselves as the member of a superior in-group, they may experience
both decreased guilt for their aggressive behavior and decreased empathy for their victims
(Haslam et al., 2007). Taken together, this research suggests that the motivation behind bias
crimes may itself be responsible for the use of more extreme or excessive violence, thereby
leading to more serious victim injuries (Lantz & Kim, 2019).
At the same time, other research has suggested that weapons may play an important role
in facilitating and exacerbating the physical trauma associated with violence. In general,
research has indicated that, when weapons are used, injuries to the victim tend to be more
severe than when weapons are not used, in part because weapons make violence easier (e.g.,
Wells & Horney, 2002). In this context, weapons, and guns in particular, allow individuals
to detach themselves and increase emotional distance from a victim, thereby exacerbating
violence (Braga et al., 2020; Wells & Horney, 2002). Emmert et al. (2018), for example,
found that when an individual was in possession of a weapon during an incident, the victim
tended to suffer more severe physical consequences, compared with situations where the
individual did not possess a weapon. Following this, it is also possible that weapon use may
play an important role in the severity of hate-motivated violence, compared with other vio-
lence. Examining this possibility is especially important given recent policy efforts attempt-
ing to prohibit individuals who have been convicted of misdemeanor hate crimes from
purchasing or possessing firearms (Stockler, 2019), thereby implicitly assuming that guns
play an important role in such violence. Existing research, however, provides little empiri-
cal basis on which to base such assumptions, thereby limiting our ability to structure an
informed debate regarding such hate crime policy efforts.
4 Criminal Justice and Behavior

Differences by Bias Type

While a number of researchers have argued that bias crimes are more severe than nonbias
crimes, there is also reason to suspect that there is variability in the severity of violence
involved for some hate crimes, compared with other hate crimes. There is substantial evi-
dence indicating that sexual orientation hate crimes, in particular, exhibit more severe vio-
lence than other types of hate crimes (Comstock, 1991; Dunbar, 2006; Stacey, 2011; Stotzer,
2012). Despite the fact that gay and bisexual individuals compose only an estimated 3.5%
of the population, sexual orientation–based hate crimes make up approximately 30% of
reported hate crimes each year (Gates, 2014; Stotzer, 2012).1 Stotzer (2012) similarly found,
using Uniform Crime Report (UCR) data from 2001 to 2010, that, on average, lesbians, gay
men, and bisexuals reported being victims of hate-motivated crimes against persons at rates
approximately double those among Black and Jewish people. More importantly, Comstock
(1991) found that injuries in sexual orientation–based hate crimes are often more severe
than other crimes, resulting in excruciatingly painful lacerations, head injuries, puncture
wounds, and chest wounds. Dunbar (2006) also found that sexual orientation hate crimes
evidenced more serious violence than other types of hate crimes, including racial/ethnic and
religious hate crimes. His research noted that aggressive tactics, such as assault and sexual
assault, were frequently observed among sexual orientation–based hate crimes. Most
recently, Lantz and Kim (2019) found that antisexual orientation bias crimes were roughly
53% more likely than nonbias crimes to involve serious victim injury. They also found that
sexual orientation hate crimes were more severe than other hate crimes, and that such dif-
ferences could not be explained by factors otherwise associated with increased violence,
like the involvement of multiple perpetrators.
Prior research suggests that sexual orientation hate crimes are typically more violent and
severe in nature for several reasons. Herek (1990) contends that heterosexism, or stigmati-
zation of homosexuals, is responsible for antigay violence. In other words, homosexuals are
stigmatized by heterosexuals for violating traditional gender norms, and those people who
engage in sexual orientation–based hate crimes may feel the need to severely punish those
that violate traditional masculinity and femininity because of their perception that homo-
sexuality is socially and personally threatening (Berrill, 1990). Other research suggests
antigay violence is an assertion of masculinity and provides an outlet for prejudiced indi-
viduals to attack homosexuals whom they view as socially deviant (Bufkin, 1999;
Gruenewald & Allison, 2018; Perry, 2001). Taken together, those who commit antisexual
orientation hate crime intend to “send a message to victims of these crimes that they are
different or less than human” (Lantz & Kim, 2019, pp. 450–451; see also Posselt, 2017).
Following this, the extreme animus associated with sexual orientation hate crimes suggests
physical severity of violence may be particularly strong for such crimes, even in compari-
son with other hate crimes.

Current Study
The current research examines the role of weapon use in hate crime violence, focusing
on the relationship between weapon use and victim injury, and drawing comparisons
between bias crimes and nonbias crimes. To that end, and drawing from prior research, we
investigate two competing hypotheses regarding the role that weapons might play in violent
hate crime victimization. On one hand, prior research indicates both that hate crimes are
 Malcom, Lantz / Hate Crimes and Weapon Use 5

more physically severe than other crimes (e.g., J. Levin & McDevitt, 1993) and that weap-
ons facilitate physical severity (e.g., Emmert et al., 2018). Following this, weapons may
play a particularly prominent role in bias crime victimization, compared with nonbias vic-
timization (Hypothesis 1). On the other hand, previous studies have also suggested that the
bias motivation underlying hate crime offending may itself be associated with increased
animus and, therefore, more severe physical injury. As such, weapons may actually play a
less prominent role in bias crime victimization, compared with nonbias victimization
(Hypothesis 2). Taken together, the current research asks the following questions: Are hate
crimes more physically severe because they are more likely to involve weapon use? Or, are
hate crimes more severe because other processes render weapons unnecessary for inflicting
serious violence on a victim? Finally, prior research has indicated that sexual orientation
hate crimes are particularly violent, even in comparison with other hate crimes (e.g., Stacey,
2011). Following this, we expect the observed relationships between hate crime offending
and weapon use to be particularly strong for such crimes (Hypothesis 3).

Method
Data

The present research uses data from the NIBRS, which provides detailed incident-level
data on bias-motivated offending and other violence, weapon use, and severity of victim
injury (Federal Bureau of Investigation [FBI], 2018). More specifically, we use data on all
violent crimes (i.e., assault, robbery, sexual assault, homicide), from the offender, offense,
and victim data segments.2 Because of our focus on hate crimes, which are relatively uncom-
mon, we use multiple years of data (2010–2016), resulting in 10,993 violent bias-motivated
crimes.3 Because of the very large sample of nonbias-motivated crimes, we follow Lyons
and Roberts (2014) and select a random sample of nonbias crimes equal to 5 times the num-
ber of bias crimes (N = 54,965; see also Lantz & Kim, 2019). This sampling strategy
reduces the likelihood of incorrectly rejecting the null hypothesis (i.e., Type I error) as a
result of inflated statistical power.4 As such, the total sample includes a total of 65,958 inci-
dents; after listwise deletion of missing data, the final sample is comprised of 54,649 total
violent crimes, 8,019 of which are bias-motivated.5
It is important to note that the NIBRS data do not currently include all agencies and juris-
dictions in the United States. According to the FBI, about 46% of agencies nationwide
participate in submitting incident-based data to the FBI, thus limiting their generalizability
to some extent. That said, prior research has indicated that the NIBRS data are especially
reliable for certain offenses, including aggravated assault and other serious violence
(Addington, 2008). NIBRS is also the only national-level data containing incident-level
information on bias and nonbias crime, variation in nonlethal and lethal injury, and a suffi-
cient number of bias crimes necessary to facilitate comparisons with nonbias crimes; as
such, the data represent an excellent source of information for the current analysis.

Measures

The current research uses two primary dependent measures: victim injury and weapon
use. First, we create a single dichotomous measure indicating whether the victim was seri-
ously injured or killed. An incident is coded as involving serious injury if any victim suf-
fered from broken bones, internal injury, loss of teeth, severe lacerations, unconsciousness,
6 Criminal Justice and Behavior

or other major injuries. If the victim was not injured or only suffered a minor injury, the
incident is coded as not involving a serious injury. Because homicides represent only a
small fraction of offenses (<0.4%), yet are theoretically important for our research ques-
tion, we combine such offenses with those involving serious injury, creating one single
outcome measure indicating whether the victim was seriously injured or killed (1 = yes).
We also note that the functional difference between incidents involving serious injury (i.e.,
internal bleeding) and death may just as likely be the result of other differences (e.g., prox-
imity to emergency medical care) as it is to be the result of differences in the intent of those
committing the crime. Second, weapon use is coded as a dichotomous measure indicating
whether any weapon, including an automatic weapon, handgun, rifle, shotgun, other fire-
arm, knife or cutting instrument, blunt object, motor vehicle, poison, explosive, and incen-
diary device, was used in the course of an incident. Following prior research, other incidents,
including those involving hands and feet, are coded as not involving a weapon (Cunningham
& Vandiver, 2018). Because of the nature of the analyses, weapon is used as both a depen-
dent and independent measure.
Our second primary independent measure is whether an incident was motivated by bias
(i.e., a hate crime). Bias motivation is measured using a dichotomous measure indicating
whether the incident was motivated by bias or not (1 = yes). In the final stage of the
research, in which we focus on differences between bias motivation, we also create a
dummy measure indicating whether the offense was motivated by antisexual orientation
bias (1 = yes), compared with other bias types (i.e., antiracial, antireligious, antiethnicity,
or antidisability).6 In the later stages of the analysis, we introduce an additional interaction
measure between the dichotomous bias motivation measure and weapon use to assess
whether the relationship between bias and serious injury varies according to whether the
incident involved a weapon.
The final analyses also include a number of additional control measures. First, because
recent research has indicated that co-offending is related to both hate crime offending and
severity of violence (Lantz & Kim, 2019), we elect not to exclude such cases from the
analyses; instead, we control for whether or not an incident involved multiple individuals
committing the crime (1 = yes). Because of the relationship between group and gang activ-
ity, we also include a dummy measure indicating whether any of the offenses were known
to involve gang activity (1 = yes). Second, the analysis includes control measures for the
sex, age, and race of all individuals involved in the incident (i.e., both alleged offenders and
victims). The same coding scheme is used for both offenders and victims; because we
include incidents involving multiple offenders or victims in the analyses, most of these
measures are represented using proportion measures, rather than traditional dummy mea-
sures (see Lantz, 2020a, for a similar approach). Age is coded as the mean of all offenders
and of all victims. Sex is coded into a proportion measure indicating the proportion of
offenders or victims who were male, relative to female. A similar coding scheme was used
for the coding of race, which is coded into three measures: proportion White, Black, and
Other race; proportion White is used as the comparison group.7 Because whether a victim
and offender know each other likely affects the degree of violence used during an offense
(Heller et al., 1982; Lantz, 2018), we also included a dummy measure indicating whether
any of the victims knew those who committed the crime. Finally, because alcohol and drug
use may also facilitate violence (Laufer et al., 2006), we include a dummy measure for
alcohol use (1 = yes) and drug use (1 = yes) during any offense.8
 Malcom, Lantz / Hate Crimes and Weapon Use 7

Analytic Strategy

The current study examines the relationship between weapon use, bias motivation, and
severity of violence (i.e., victim injury) in three steps. First, we examine differences in
weapon use and injury at the bivariate level. Second, we present a series of logistic regres-
sion models in which we attempt to disentangle the relationship between bias motivation,
weapon use, and injury. To do so, we estimate the relationship between bias motivation and
weapon use (Model 1), as well as the overall influence of bias motivation and weapon use
on victim injury (Model 2). Third, we introduce an interaction term between weapon use
and bias motivation to disentangle the joint influence of both characteristics on serious vic-
tim injury (Model 3). Together, these three models test the joint relationship between bias
motivation, weapon use, and victim injury, speaking directly to each of our countervailing
hypotheses (i.e., Hypotheses 1 and 2). Fourth, we limit the sample to hate crimes, and exam-
ine the same relationships, with a special focus on the role of weapon use for those hate
crimes motivated by sexual orientation (Models 4 and 5; Hypothesis 3). Finally, we con-
clude by presenting sensitivity analyses in which we examine the differences between gen-
eral weapon use and firearm use specifically; because results are similar for each, and
general weapon use is more common than firearm use, we present results from the former
models.

Results
Descriptive statistics for both the full sample and bias crime sample are presented in
Table 1. Because we effectively oversample bias crimes, relative to other crimes, roughly
14.7% of the sample involves bias-motivated offenses. It is also important to note that the
proportion of incidents involving serious or lethal injury is higher in the hate crime sample
than in the full sample (.065 vs. .049). Weapon use is also slightly more common in the bias
crime sample, compared with the full sample, at the bivariate level.
These relationships are examined in a multivariate framework in Table 2 using the full
sample of both bias and nonbias crimes. Model 1 presents the results from a logistic regres-
sion analysis wherein weapon use is regressed on bias motivation as well as a number of
additional covariate control measures. Importantly, after controlling for a number of inci-
dent characteristics, the results indicate that bias crimes are significantly less likely than
nonbias crimes to involve weapon use, such that the odds of weapon use are decreased by
roughly 27.3% when crime is motivated by bias (odds ratio [OR] = .727, p < .001), in
comparison with those that are not motivated by bias.
Next, Model 2 presents results from a logistic regression analysis wherein serious victim
injury is regressed on bias motivation and weapon use. The results indicate that both bias
motivation and weapon use are significantly associated with an increased likelihood of seri-
ous or lethal victim injury. More specifically, compared with nonbias crimes, bias crimes
are associated with roughly a 14.6% increase in the odds of serious victim injury (OR =
1.146, p = .014), net of controls. The results also indicate a very strong relationship between
weapon use and serious victim injury more generally, such that incidents involving weapon
use are much more likely than incidents that do not involve weapon use to involve serious
injury (OR = 6.316, p < .001). Model 3 presents this same logistic regression model with
the addition of an interaction term between weapon use and bias. Results indicate that this
interaction term is significant and negative (OR = 0.700, p = .001), suggesting that the
8 Criminal Justice and Behavior

Table 1: Descriptive Statistics

Full sample Bias crimes Non-bias crimes

Measure M SDa M SD M SD

Bias 0.147 — 1.000 — 0.000 —

Weapon 0.166 — 0.184 — 0.163 —
Minor injury 0.383 — 0.293 — 0.399 —
Serious/lethal injury 0.049 — 0.065 — 0.046 —
Offender characteristics
Multiple offenders 0.155 — 0.218 0.145 —
Age 31.884 13.150 32.062 14.205 31.853 12.960
Male 0.759 0.412 0.814 0.372 0.749 0.417
Black 0.355 0.474 0.282 0.440 0.368 0.478
Other race 0.019 0.133 0.025 0.152 0.018 0.129
Victim characteristics
Number of victims 1.244 0.610 1.367 0.818 1.223 0.563
Age 31.870 14.268 31.957 14.271 31.854 14.267
Male 0.435 0.475 0.658 0.449 0.397 0.469
Black 0.309 0.457 0.386 0.471 0.296 0.453
Other race 0.020 0.138 0.037 0.183 0.017 0.129
Stranger 0.203 — 0.416 — 0.166 —
Other characteristics
Alcohol 0.128 — 0.164 — 0.122 —
Drug use 0.022 — 0.025 — 0.021 —
Gang 0.005 — 0.015 — 0.003 —
N 54,649 8,019 46,630

Note. Victim/offender age, sex, and race represent proportion measures. SD = standard deviation; N = number
of observations.
aSDs omitted for dichotomous measures.

relationship between weapon use and victim injury varies significantly according to whether
a violent incident is motivated by bias, and that this relationship is, in fact, weaker for bias
crimes, compared with nonbias crimes. These results are presented graphically in Figure 1.
There are three important patterns to note in Figure 1. First, there is a substantial overall
weapon effect, in that incidents that involve weapon use are substantially more likely than
those that do not involve weapons to result in serious or lethal victim injury. Second, among
those incidents that do not involve weapons, bias motivation is associated with an increased
likelihood of serious injury. Returning to Model 3 in Table 2, the conditional effect of bias
motivation supports this assertion. When a weapon is not involved, compared with nonbias
crimes, bias crimes are associated with a 36.4% increase in the odds of serious victim injury
(OR = 1.364, p < .001). Finally, while bias crimes not involving weapons are more likely
than other crimes not involving weapons to involve serious injury, weapons have a relative
equalizing effect on this relationship, such that weapons have a greater impact on victim
injury among nonbias crimes than bias crimes. In other words, weapons matter more for
nonbias crimes than for bias crimes, suggesting support for the hypothesis that weapons
play a less prominent role in such crimes (Hypothesis 2).
Next, Table 3 presents an examination of these same relationships, focusing on differ-
ences between antisexual orientation hate crimes and other hate crimes. Model 4, in which
weapon use is regressed on antisexual orientation bias and a number of controls, indicates
 Table 2: Likelihood of Weapon Use and Serious Lethal Injury for Bias and Nonbias Crimes (N = 54,649)

Model 1: Model 2: Model 3: Serious/lethal injury with

Weapon use Serious/lethal injury interaction

Measure OR p value 95% CI OR p value 95% CI OR p value 95% CI

Bias 0.727 *** [0.679, 0.778] 1.146 * [1.028, 1.278] 1.364 *** [1.180, 1.576]
Offender characteristics
Multiple offenders 1.201 *** [1.129, 1.277] 1.508 *** [1.361, 1.670] 1.504 *** [1.358, 1.665]
Age 1.003 * [1.001, 1.005] 0.996 * [0.993, 1.000] 0.996 * [0.993, 1.000]
Male 1.113 *** [1.049, 1.180] 1.858 *** [1.650, 2.091] 1.860 *** [1.652, 2.094]
Black 1.249 *** [1.175, 1.328] 1.296 *** [1.168, 1.437] 1.282 *** [1.156, 1.423]
Other race 1.140 [0.944, 1.377] 1.307 [0.966, 1.767] 1.312 [0.971, 1.773]
Victim characteristics
Number 1.498 *** [1.448, 1.550] 0.940 * [0.887, 0.996] 0.941 * [0.888, 0.997]
Age 1.004 *** [1.002, 1.006] 1.000 [0.997, 1.003] 1.000 [0.997, 1.003]
Male 2.113 *** [2.007, 2.226] 1.749 *** [1.595, 1.918] 1.735 *** [1.582, 1.903]
Black 1.397 *** [1.313, 1.486] 0.903 [0.812, 1.003] 0.907 [0.816, 1.008]
Other race 1.301 ** [1.091, 1.552] 0.938 [0.696, 1.265] 0.934 [0.693, 1.257]
Stranger 1.915 *** [1.814, 2.022] 0.968 [0.880, 1.066] 0.966 [0.878, 1.063]
Other characteristics
Alcohol 0.957 [0.891, 1.029] 1.647 *** [1.475, 1.838] 1.652 *** [1.480, 1.844]
Drug use 1.590 *** [1.377, 1.835] 1.330 * [1.060, 1.668] 1.331 * [1.061, 1.669]
Gang 1.518 ** [1.137, 2.027] 1.535 * [1.028, 2.292] 1.558 * [1.047, 2.319]
Weapon use
Weapon 6.316 *** [5.807, 6.868] 6.776 *** [6.172, 7.439]
Bias × Weapon 0.700 ** [0.569, 0.859]

Note. OR = odds ratio; CI = confidence interval.

*p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.

9
10 Criminal Justice and Behavior

Predicted Probability of Serious/Lethal 0.08

0.07

0.06

0.05
Injury

0.04

0.03

0.02

0.01

0
No Bias Bias
No Weapon Weapon

Figure 1: Predicted Probability of Serious/Lethal Victim Injury by Bias and Weapon Use

Table 3: Likelihood of Weapon Use and Serious Lethal Injury for Bias Crimes Only (N = 8,019)

Model 4: Weapon use Model 5: Serious/lethal injury

Measure OR p value 95% CI OR p value 95% CI

Antisexual orientation 0.794 ** [0.679, 0.927] 1.547 *** [1.248, 1.918]

Offender characteristics
Multiple offenders 1.208 ** [1.049, 1.391] 1.855 *** [1.508, 2.280]
Age 1.008 ** [1.003, 1.012] 0.987 ** [0.979, 0.995]
Male 1.156 [0.971, 1.377] 2.159 *** [1.508, 3.091]
Black 0.989 [0.861, 1.137] 1.526 *** [1.237, 1.883]
Other race 1.397 [0.974, 2.005] 1.346 [0.775, 2.339]
Victim characteristics
Number 1.315 *** [1.236, 1.400] 1.071 [0.970, 1.183]
Age 0.995 * [0.991, 1.000] 1.006 [0.999, 1.014]
Male 1.566 *** [1.354, 1.813] 1.430 ** [1.104, 1.851]
Black 1.246 ** [1.098, 1.413] 0.654 *** [0.528, 0.808]
Other race 1.015 [0.732, 1.406] 0.722 [0.413, 1.260]
Stranger 1.482 *** [1.319, 1.666] 1.459 *** [1.207, 1.764]
Other characteristics
Alcohol 1.124 [0.965, 1.309] 1.675 *** [1.329, 2.110]
Drug use 1.516 * [1.092, 2.103] 0.958 [0.563, 1.629]
Gang 1.583 * [1.056, 2.372] 1.815 * [1.069, 3.082]
Weapon 4.839 *** [3.997, 5.858]

Note. OR = odds ratio; CI = confidence interval.

*p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.

that such hate crimes are significantly less likely to involve weapon use, even in comparison
with other hate crimes (OR = 0.794, p = .004). Furthermore, Model 5 indicates that, in
comparison with other hate crimes, antisexual orientation hate crimes are much more likely
 Malcom, Lantz / Hate Crimes and Weapon Use 11

to involve serious injury. Put another way, net of controls, antisexual orientation hate crimes
are associated with a 54.7% increase in the odds of serious injury relative to other hate
crimes. Results to this point indicate that bias crimes have an elevated risk of injury despite
a decreased likelihood of weapon use generally, suggesting support for the hypothesis that
these relationships would be stronger for such crimes (Hypothesis 3). Taken together, the
results presented in Table 3 indicate that these patterns are especially strong among anti-
sexual orientation hate crimes, even compared with other hate crimes.9
Finally, while all weapons have the potential to distance individuals who commit a crime
from the violence in which they are participating, prior research suggests that these effects
are likely particularly pronounced for firearms (e.g., Wells & Horney, 2002). Recent legisla-
tive efforts, moreover, have largely focused specifically on preventing access to firearms.
As such, we also conducted sensitivity analyses wherein we examined the relationships
observed here for firearms specifically rather than weapons generally. Results were sub-
stantively and statistically similar. They are, in fact, even more pronounced: Bias-motivated
crimes are much less likely than nonbias crimes to involve firearm use, such that hate
crimes, compared with other crimes, are associated with a 63% decrease in the odds of fire-
arm use, net of controls (OR = 0.375, p < .001). Firearm use is also significantly and posi-
tively associated with serious injury (OR = 2.396, p < .001). Finally, there is a significant
negative interaction effect between bias and firearm use, suggesting that the effect of fire-
arms is again weaker for hate crimes, compared with other crimes (OR = 0.662, p = .043).
Because these relationships are similar, and general weapon use is more common than
firearm use, we elected to present the results examining general weapon effects.

Discussion
Prior research has consistently found that hate crimes are more physically severe than
other types of crimes, and that weapon use plays an important role in facilitating and exac-
erbating the physical severity of violent victimization (e.g., Emmert et al., 2018; Pezzella &
Fetzer, 2017). Yet, prior research has neglected to consider the role that weapons may play
in the physical severity of hate crime victimization, especially in comparison with nonbias
crimes. This omission is especially important given recent policy conversations regarding
restricting access to weapons for those individuals who have previously been convicted of
committing hate crimes. Following this, the current research adds to prior hate crime
research by exploring the role of weapon use in hate crime violence.
The results suggest four important findings. First, our results indicate that those who
engage in hate crimes are significantly less likely to use a weapon than those who engage in
other crimes. Second, our results indicate that controlling for weapon use, bias crimes are
more likely to involve serious or lethal injury. Third, we observe a significant interaction
between weapon use and bias motivation, indicating that weapon use has a smaller effect
for hate crimes than other crimes. Put simply, weapon use matters less for hate crimes, com-
pared with other crimes. Finally, we found that these patterns are particularly strong for hate
crimes motivated by antisexual orientation bias.
These findings suggest that exploring the mechanisms facilitating severe violence with-
out a weapon may provide insight into the etiology of hate crime violence. We posit that one
important mechanism behind the observed relationships may be the dehumanization of hate
12 Criminal Justice and Behavior

crime victims, a process by which those who commit hate crimes strip victims of their
human qualities and assign them to a subhuman status (Hagan & Rymond-Richmond, 2008;
Haslam et al., 2007). Other research has noted that hate crimes function to “punish victims
for their individual or collective performance of identity,” or rather for being members of
groups that potential aggressors perceive as inferior or different (Perry, 2001, p. 55). Our
findings suggest that it is possible that dehumanization may be “disengaging moral self-
sanctions” in individuals who commit hate crimes, facilitating increased violent behavior
(Haslam et al., 2007, p. 410; see also Byers et al., 1999). The disengagement of self-sanc-
tions and accompanying relaxed moral boundaries may be allowing individuals who com-
mit hate crimes to punish victims—who they view as inferior—with severe physical
violence, even without the aid of a weapon. In addition, these dehumanization processes
may vary between hate crimes. Antisexual orientation hate crimes were particularly violent
and particularly unlikely to involve weapons, suggesting that dehumanization could be
playing a crucial role in permitting the varying levels of violence commonly observed
between types of hate crime offenses.
It is also possible that the explanation for the increased severity associated with hate
crime, even when a weapon is not involved, may be partially attributable to differential
motivations for nonbias crimes, compared with bias crimes. Most violent hate crime
involves a desire by those who commit them to exercise power and control (Perry, 2001), a
desire that is likely realized by causing injury and fear to the victim, with or without a
weapon. There is significantly more variation, however, in motivations for nonbias vio-
lence. In other words, while many instances of nonbias crime are also likely to be expres-
sive in nature, it is also likely that nonbias crime is more frequently instrumental in nature.
As such, nonbias violence may involve a number of motivations other than causing harm to
a victim, as is the case, for example, when an individual commits a robbery to obtain money
or other goods.
Finally, it is possible that hate crimes may be more spontaneous in nature than other
crimes, thus decreasing the possibility that the perpetrators have a weapon at the time of the
offense. J. Levin and McDevitt’s (1993) typology of people who commit hate crimes, for
example, posits that the majority of hate crimes are thrill-seeking in nature, such that they
typically involve young groups of peers who are seeking excitement and “who regard hatred
as cool.” Such crime is less likely to be premeditated and therefore may not offer the chance
for individuals to bring a weapon to use during the offense. That said, it is important to note
that those hate crimes which fit the thrill-seeking typology are typically committed by
young people in groups, characteristics which we control for in the current research, and are
typically less violent in nature than other hate crime types (e.g., mission). Thus, while this
explanation does not necessarily explain why individuals who commit hate crime would
subsequently be more likely to injure victims than those who commit other crimes, it does
provide one potential explanation for the observed weapon effects.
Returning to our results more generally, we also found that the relationships we observe
are particularly strong for hate crimes motivated by antisexual orientation bias. More spe-
cifically, we found that antisexual orientation hate crimes are significantly less likely to
involve weapon use, even in comparison with other hate crimes. That said, and despite this
decreased weapon use, antisexual orientation hate crimes are also associated with a 54.7%
increase in the odds of serious or lethal injury relative to other hate crimes. In other words,
individuals who commit antisexual orientation hate crimes are significantly less likely to
 Malcom, Lantz / Hate Crimes and Weapon Use 13

use a weapon than those individuals who commit other hate crimes but are still more likely
to inflict serious victim injury.
Some recent research by Levy and Levy (2017) found evidence that policies which exac-
erbate legal inequalities increase hate crimes directed at gay and lesbian victims, while
those that extend legal equality reduce these hate crimes. While their research examined
hate crime frequency, it is reasonable to expect that such patterns may extend to severity as
well. Following this, it may be important to consider the trends that we observe within this
broader context. More specifically, the data used for the current analysis span a period of
time in which policy changes affecting the LGBTQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and
queer or questioning) community were largely becoming more inclusive (i.e., 2010–2016);
our results still, however, indicate that hate crimes targeting victims based on their sexual
orientation often involve excessive brutality. The Trump administration, however, which
began shortly after the time period examined here, has reversed many of the policies and
protections extended to the LGBTQ community during the Obama administration (Berg &
Syed, 2019). When taken together, the patterns observed by Levy and Levy (2017) and in
the current research suggest that these policy changes may have serious consequences for
antisexual orientation hate crime frequency and severity. As such, future research using
more recent data should consider whether such hate crimes have become more frequent or
more severe given recent policy changes which might serve to legitimate animus toward
this population.
Taken together, our research indicates that individuals who commit hate crimes use
weapons less frequently than those who commit other crimes, a finding that may have theo-
retical implications for understanding violent offending more generally, both bias-moti-
vated and otherwise. Wells and Horney (2002) found that “guns do not require sustained
[physical and psychological] effort; thus, persons would be able to do more damage to
victims if they instead had a gun” (p. 266). In other words, in many cases, weapons serve to
facilitate violence. Our findings, however, indicate that this may not be true for all violent
offending, especially if alternative mechanisms—like animus toward the victim—other-
wise exacerbate the severity of violence. Individuals who engage in hate crimes are more
willing than others to use their own bodies to inflict serious victim injury without a weapon,
indicating that weapons are not a necessary component of hate crime violence.
Thus, these findings imply that empirical attention to the motivation behind hate crime
offending may shed important insight into offending behavior and victimization outcomes.
More specifically, these results indicate that the nature of hate crime violence may be etio-
logically distinct from other types of violence, thereby suggesting that a promising avenue
for future research may be understanding why hate crimes are different. Some research has
emphasized that paying further attention to the prejudicial motivation involved in hate
crimes—and how this motivation structures differences and similarities between hate
crimes and other crimes—is important (Gladfelter et al., 2017), and this study lends support
to that argument. The evidence from this study, in particular, suggests that attending to the
bias motivation behind the incident might hold particular promise in explaining why hate
crimes may be different from other crimes.
These results also have important policy implications. If bias and animus are indeed driv-
ing factors behind the high levels of hate crime violence, then policy initiatives aimed at
preventing and unlearning prejudice might be particularly promising avenues for reducing
hate crime violence. For example, Gaias et al. (2018) found that young children’s exposure
to diverse environments and materials (e.g., multicultural books) in preschool was
14 Criminal Justice and Behavior

associated with an increased likelihood of having cross-race friends in first grade, which
was then associated with an increased likelihood of cross-race friendships and decreased
racial bias in third grade. In terms of preventing future hate crimes, schools could focus on
increasing and fostering diverse early school environments and education. Other research
suggests that diverse educational programs can also effectively target older students (e.g.,
Gonzalez et al., 2017). Together, this research suggests that diverse educational programs
may be an important step toward reducing prejudice, thus affecting hate crime violence.
Therefore, policies geared toward individuals who have committed hate crimes in the form
of educational forums could “promote appreciation for diversity, friendships with out-group
members, and insight into one’s own prejudice and stereotypes” (Rudman et al., 2001, p.
866). Future research should explore the impact of programs like these for unlearning preju-
dice, as well as their direct implications for hate crime offending.
The results presented here may also be particularly important to consider in the context
of low hate crime victim reporting rates (Zaykowski, 2010). Recent research has indicated
that victim reporting in the United States, compared with other countries, is both low and
decreasing (Myers & Lantz, 2020). Others have noted that LGBT victims may be especially
unlikely to engage with and cooperate with police (Lantz, 2020b). Our research suggests
that individuals who commit hate crimes are willing to inflict serious injury without a
weapon, especially toward victims of antisexual orientation hate crimes, which may be
indicative of particularly high levels of animosity toward victims. Following this, one espe-
cially salient reason for low victim reporting may be a fear of retaliation or physical retribu-
tion. These results suggest that policy approaches which reduce victim fear of retaliation,
like the implementation of third-party reporting centers, might be beneficial. Such centers
are places, typically unaffiliated with the police, where hate crime victims can report crimes
to trained individuals—anonymously if they so choose—thus reducing the risk of retalia-
tion. These centers can be effective given proper implementation (Wong et al., 2019), but
their effectiveness has not been closely examined in the United States.
Our findings also have potential implications for future hate crime legislation. Recent
legislation, for example, has attempted to prevent individuals previously convicted of hate
crime offenses from having access to weapons. The recently proposed Disarm Hate Act, for
example, would enact legislation that would prohibit individuals who have been convicted
of misdemeanor hate crimes from purchasing or possessing firearms. This legislation col-
loquially assumes guns to be an important factor in hate crime violence, but previous
research has not considered this relationship in depth. Our results suggest that such legisla-
tion may indeed have an impact, but that reducing gun access will likely not be enough to
substantially reduce hate crime violence. Of course, given the demonstrated direct effect of
weapons on serious injury in this research, legislation of this nature is a step in the right
direction: Individuals who have weapons when committing a hate crime are still more likely
to hurt victims than those who do not. Moreover, even if guns and other weapons are not
essential components of hate crime violence on average, it is possible that such legislation
might be effective in reducing the most heinous hate crimes involving firearms, like the
2015 Charleston Church Shooting or the 2019 El Paso Shooting. That said, our results indi-
cate that the average person who commits a hate crime is more willing than others to inflict
serious injury even without the aid of a weapon. Thus, from a policy perspective, these
results indicate that it may be just as important, if not more important, to focus on the under-
lying bias behind the offense. In addition to focusing on weapon use, future policy
 Malcom, Lantz / Hate Crimes and Weapon Use 15

initiatives should aim to better understand and target the mechanisms behind hate crime
offending (i.e., bias) as well.
The current study is, of course, not without limitations. First, we cannot explicitly mea-
sure the mechanisms responsible for the relationships observed here. While we suggest
various mechanisms, like dehumanization, we cannot explicitly measure such processes.
Future research should examine weapon effects and hate victimization among other data
sources (e.g., Ruback et al., 2018) to directly assess these mechanisms. Second, the current
research uses official data to examine the relationship between bias motivation, weapon
use, and severity of violence. As such, it is possible that the hate crimes that are included
in this sample are those that fit more stereotypical perceptions of hate crimes (Lantz et al.,
2019). In other words, police officers often perceive “true” hate crimes as involving vio-
lence (Craig & Waldo, 1996; Lyons, 2008). However, not all hate crimes are physically
violent; instead, harassment, threats, and vandalism are frequently reported as hate crimes
as well (Barnes & Ephross, 1994). Given, however, that the focus of this research is on the
most serious hate crimes—those involving weapon use and serious injury—and serious
crimes are especially likely to come to the attention of the police (Skogan, 1984; Xie &
Baumer, 2019), we think our estimates unlikely to be seriously affected by these
limitations.

Conclusion
To this point, research has not explicitly considered the role that weapon use plays in hate
crime violence and victimization, despite policy efforts intended to address weapon use
during hate crime offenses. The current study attempts to address this gap in the literature
by assessing how bias motivation might affect offending behavior, and how the use of a
weapon might interact with this behavior. A fair bit of research has examined whether hate
crimes are more severe; this research has, however, largely neglected to address why hate
crimes are more severe than other types of nonbias crimes. This study finds that hate crimes
are less likely to involve weapon use but still more likely than other crimes to involve seri-
ous injury; this is especially true for antisexual orientation hate crimes. We suggest that the
dehumanization of hate crime victims, among other mechanisms, might be one factor
behind these trends. By understanding the mechanisms behind hate crime offending, as this
research aims to do, we may be better able to move toward accurately explaining and effec-
tively countering hate crime violence.

ORCID iDs
Zachary T. Malcom https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6443-7688
Brendan Lantz https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9086-5662

Notes
1. It is worth noting that exact estimates are unknown and could vary. According to Gates (2014), surveys of those iden-
tifying as LGBTQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer or questioning) varied from 2.2% in the National Health
Interview Survey (NHIS) to 4.0% in Gallup data.
2. While we have made efforts throughout this article to avoid using stigmatizing labels (e.g., offenders) to refer to indi-
viduals who have allegedly committed hate crimes, we use the term “offender” when referring specifically to data obtained
from the “offender segment” of the National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) data. We do so to reduce confusion,
as the data are reported by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in this manner.
16 Criminal Justice and Behavior

3. The NIBRS data include information on bias motivation for up to 10 offenses, 99 victims, and 99 offenders. We
included information on all offenses and up to 10 offenders and 10 victims. It is important to note that, while incidents involv-
ing more than 10 offenders or 10 victims do occur, they are exceedingly rare; moreover, recent research by Lantz and Wenger
(2020) indicates that the exclusion of such incidents when analyzing the NIBRS data does not statistically bias the resulting
estimates. Indeed, in most cases, the inclusion of three records from each segment results in statistically valid estimates.
4. More specifically, using the full sample of cases would result in a very large sample of 8,567,369 violent crimes,
8,556,376 of which are not bias-motivated. Running the analysis on this full sample would drastically inflate statistical power,
thus increasing our risk of a Type I error, or incorrectly rejecting the null hypothesis. That said, we also think it is important to
note that there are far more nonbias crimes than bias crimes. Thus, we follow prior research and select a random sample of the
nonbias crimes equal to 5 times the sample size of the bias crimes (Lantz & Kim, 2019; Lyons & Roberts, 2014).
5. We also conducted sensitivity analyses in which we ran each model using imputed data; the conclusions based on these
imputed data were substantively unchanged. Following this, we present results using listwise deletion, which is consistent
with general recommendations and prior research using these data (Addington, 2006; Allison, 2002).
6. The NIBRS data include information on bias motivation for up to 10 offenses, meaning that it is possible for incidents
to include multiple bias motivations. We coded bias motivation accordingly, allowing each incident to be measured as more
than one motivation type. It is, however, important to note that, in reality, it is rare for an incident to list more than one bias
motivation in the data (Lantz & Wenger, 2020).
7. Unfortunately, the FBI only recently started collecting information on offender ethnicity in 2013 and has a very high
degree of missing information. The variable thus cannot be analyzed using listwise deletion procedures and has too much
missing information to be reliably imputed using missing imputation procedures.
8. Multicollinearity diagnostics revealed that multicollinearity is not an issue in the current analysis.
9. We also conducted analyses wherein we introduced an interaction term between antisexual orientation bias and weapon
use in the bias only sample. While the interaction term was in the expected direction and of similar magnitude to that observed
for bias overall, the result was not statistically significant (odds ratio [OR] = 0.754, p > .05). Given the much smaller sample
size in this model, however, it is important to note that we cannot rule out the possibility of a Type II error, or the possibility
that variation does exist despite the lack of a significant relationship in this study.

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Zachary T. Malcom is a graduate research assistant in the College of Criminology and Criminal Justice at Florida State
University. His research interests focus on hate crime, violence, race and crime, and victimization.

Brendan Lantz is an assistant professor of criminology and criminal justice, and director of the Hate Crime Research and
Policy Institute at Florida State University. His research interests focus on hate crime, violence, victimization, race and crime,
and co-offending. His work has appeared in a number of research outlets, including Journal of Research in Crime and
Delinquency, Justice Quarterly, British Journal of Criminology, Criminology & Public Policy, Psychology of Violence,
Aggressive Behavior, Journal of Interpersonal Violence, Criminal Justice and Behavior, Journal of Experimental Criminology,
and Crime & Delinquency.