A Common Target: Anti-Jewish Hate Crime in New York City Communities, 1995-2010

• Published date: 01 November 2020
• Author: Colleen E. Mills
• DOI: 10.1177/0022427820902832
• Date: 01 November 2020
• Subject Matter: Articles

Article

A Common Target:

Anti-Jewish Hate

Crime in New York

City Communities,

1995-2010

Colleen E. Mills

1

Abstract

Objectives: There is a growing body of macro-level studies examining hate

crime. These studies however largely focus on ethnoracial hate crime,

leading to a relative dearth of research investigating the etiology of anti-

Jewish hate crime. The current study seeks to fill this gap by conducting a

community-level analysis of anti-Jewish hate crime in New York City. Meth-

ods: Using data from the New York Police Department’s Hate Crimes Task

Force, the current study employs a series of negative binomial regressions

to investigate the impact of defended neighborhoods, social disorganization,

and strain variables on anti-Jewish hate crime. Results: The results show that

defended neighborhoods consistently predict higher levels of anti-Jewish

hate crime in White, Black, and non-White neighborhoods even when

accounting for social disorganization and strain variables. Results also

demonstrate that anti-Jewish crime occurs in communities that are more

socially organized and with better economic conditions. Conclusions: This

study’s findings reveal Jewish victims to be a catchall target when a minority

1

Pennsylvania State University, Abington, PA, USA

Corresponding Author:

Colleen E. Mills, Pennsylvania State University, Abington, 1600 Woodland Road, Sutherland

310C, Abington, PA 19001, USA.

Email: cem92@psu.edu

Journal of Research in Crime and

Delinquency

2020, Vol. 57(6) 643-692

ªThe Author(s) 2020

Article reuse guidelines:

sagepub.com/journals-permissions

DOI: 10.1177/0022427820902832

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group increasingly moves into a majority area. These defended neighbor-

hoods, and other findings have intriguing implications for both criminology’s

social disorganization theory and the police and others charged with com-

batting bias crimes.

Keywords

hate crime, bias crime, group conflict

During the “Unite the Right” Rally in Charlottesville in August 2017, White

supremacists marched throughout the city and on the University of Virgi-

nia’s campus, shouting Nazi and anti-Semitic slogans, including “blood and

soil” and “Jews will not replace us.” The events in Charlottesville occurred

against the backdrop of increasing visibility of White supremacist activity

and anti-Semitic invective since the 2016 presidential election campaign (E.

Green 2017; Rosenberg 2017). Tracking bo th criminal and noncriminal

incidents, the Anti-Defamation League (2018) found a sharp increase in

anti-Semitic incidents between 2016 and 2017. National hate crime data

consistently show that anti-Jewish hate crime makes up the majority of anti-

religious hate crime, which typically accounts for a fifth of all hate crime;

however, anti-Islamic hate crime has accounted for a larger proportion of

religious bias-motivated crime in the past two decades and are likely

underrepresented in official statistics by being recording under ethnic

bias-motivated offenses (Disha, Cavendish, and King 2011; Scheitle and

Hansmann 2017). Recent data from the Uniform Crime Report show that

anti-Jewish hate crime continues to constitute over half of all recorded anti-

religious hate crime. Their data also demonstrate that anti-Jewish crime has

risen in recent years (U.S. Department of Justice 2016, 2017, 2018). Such

rising anti-Semitic activity culminated in the deadliest attack against Jewish

people in the United States when a White supremacist active in extremist

circles online carried out a mass shooting at the Tree of Life synagogue in

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, killing 11 and injuring another 6 congregants in

October 2018 (Amend 2018a, 2018b; Selk et al. 2018).

Anti-Semitism has had a long history in the United States and remains an

integral part of White supremacist ideologies. At the same time, anti-

Semitism has declined in recent decades in the United States as studies

show increasing warmth toward Jewish people (J. E. Cohen 2018; Gersten-

feld 2011; Scheitle and Hansmann 2017). Tracking anti-Semitism in the

United States, the Anti-Defamation League (2016, 2017) found that 14

644 Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency 57(6)

percent of respondents held anti-Semi tic views, a finding that has been

relatively stable over the past two decades. The events in Charlottesville

and Pittsburgh however took place in a larger context in which anti-Jewish

incidents and hate crimes have risen in recent years (Anti-Defamation

League 2018; Bjork-James 2017). Unlike other bias types (e.g., anti-Black),

property crimes, rather than crimes against persons, make up the majority of

anti-Jewish hate crime (Gerstenfeld 2011; U.S. Department of Justice 2016,

2017, 2018). Although anti-Jewish hate crime is more likely to target prop-

erty rather than persons, such hate crime nonetheless “hurts more” than

victimizations not motivated by bias. Studies (Barnes and Ephross 1994;

Iganski and Lagou 2009; Lim 2009; McDevitt et al. 2001) demonstrate that

hate crime causes greater psychological and emotional harm as both the

immediate victims of hate crime and the larger communities to which they

belong experience greater feelings of fearfulness and engage in avoidance

behaviors.

Several studies have investigated how macro-level conditions explain

hate crime offending, ranging from the community level to the state level.

These studies however have focused on explaining anti-ethnoracial hate

crime for the most part (Gladfelter, Lantz, and Ruback 2017; Grattet

2009; D. P. Green, Strolovitch, and Wong 1998; Lyons 2007, 2008a; Mills

2019a) but also antigay (Alden and Parker 2005; D. P. Green et al. 2001;

Mills 2019b; Stacey 2018; Van Dyke, Soule, and Widom 2001) and anti-

Arab/Muslim (Disha et al. 2011) hate crime. Although these works illumi-

nate the effect of macro-level conditions on hate crime, gaps still remain as

studies investigating the etiology of hate crime have long neglected to

address anti-Jewish hate crime.

This body of literature also illustrates the importance of disaggregating

hate crime by bias type. While the hate crime research testing traditional

criminological theories, such as social disorganization and strain, is mixed,

it also shows that the evidence can outright contradict the theories (Mills

2019a) depending on the bias type (Lyons 2007). These mixed findings

emphasize the importance of further applying criminological theories to

explain different types of hate crime to investigate whether such theories

need revision when it comes to the explaining hate crime versus regular

crime.

Relatedly, the current study applies the social disorganization theory to

religious-based hate crime, which raises an opportunity to discuss whether

social disorganization theory’s understanding of diversity should be recon-

sidered. Per Shaw and McKay’s (1942) original theory, community-level

disadvantage, residential instability, and diversity are the hallmarks of

Mills 645