Scottsdale Approaches 2-Year Streak of Zero Reported Hate Crimes

New data from the Scottsdale Police Department and the FBI renders Scottsdale as one of Arizona's safest cities, as the city reported lower crime rates and is close to reaching its two-year streak for zero reports of hate crimes.

At the Scottsdale Human Relations Commission meeting on Oct. 11, Scottsdale Police Detective Garrett Weiger revealed in the city’s quarterly hate crime statistics and year-to-date totals for 2021, that the city has reported no hate crimes so far this year.

“I am happy to report up to this point we do not have any hate crimes that meet the official definition at all in 2021, so that's a good thing so far,” Weiger said.

During the meeting, Weiger clarified the criteria for hate crimes: “a committed criminal offense which is motivated in whole or part by an offender’s bias against race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, ethnicity, gender, or gender identity.”

Scottsdale and the FBI hold the same definition for what constitutes a hate crime, which must “be a criminal offense as defined by state statutes and motivated by a bias,” Weiger added.

With the new year right around the corner, Scottsdale is headed into completion of its second consecutive year with no reported hate crimes, an impressive closing that contrasts the newly published state and national data.

On Oct. 6, the FBI published its annual hate crime statistics for 2020, which provides state-by-state information on bias-motivated offenses from 15,138 law enforcement agencies across the country. This data showed zero reports of hate crimes in Scottsdale for this year, and Weiger’s report shows this trend has continued into 2021.

The FBI’s report is a compilation of information from 125 different law enforcement agencies in Arizona, where only 81 of these departments reported incidents of hate crimes, amounting to 282 instances total in 2020.

However, bias-related crime had increased 34 percent in Arizona this year, with 209 instances reported during 2019. Nationally, hate crimes rose 13 percent in 2020 according to the FBI’s report.

In Arizona, about 70 percent of reported hate crimes target victims based on their race/ethnicity, where 12 percent were targeted based on sexual-orientation, percent, about eight percent were targeted due to religious affiliation and two percent was based on the victim’s gender identity, the report showed.

In 2019, the city of Scottsdale reported three separate instances of hate crimes, which targeted victims based on race, religion and sexual orientation. The following spring, the city passed an anti-discrimination ordinance in April, as an effort to promote fair treatment of residents and visitors within Scottsdale that “prohibits discrimination based on actual or perceived race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, sexual orientation, gender identity or disability.”

The ordinance covers issues related to exclusion and discrimination in categories outside of criminal activity, such as employment, accommodations and housing.

On the other hand, bias-motivated offenses that meet the state statutes for a hate crime are handled by the city’s police department.

“As the detective was saying, a case has got to be made that a criminal activity occurred, '' said Brent Stockwell, Scottsdale assistant city manager and Community Celebrating Diversity Board member during the meeting on Oct. 11.

From there, “the fact that a hate crime motivation was there would be taken into consideration to be handled by the police,” Stockwell said.

As shown in the city’s impressive new data, Scottsdale is committed to the protection and inclusion of all community members.

“No matter who you are or who you love, you are welcome in Scottsdale,” said City Mayor David Ortega in a release about the non-discrimination ordinance.

Hate crimes can be reported to the Scottsdale Police by calling 1-480-312-5000, or directly to the FBI by calling 1-800-CALL-FBI or online at tips.fbi.gov.