Police join lawmakers in targeting hate crimes
STEFANIE L. PEARSON
Assistant Editor
A squad of seven officers dedicated solely to investigating hate crimes will hit the streets of Phoenix March 1, and one of its members said the squad is a good beginning but called for a legislative measure designed to stiffen the sentences of criminals they catch.
"I'm hopeful we'll diminish the number of hate crimes occurring (in Phoenix) through better investigation," said Detective Robert Chavez, hate crimes coordinator for the Phoenix Police Department. "But we don't have an increased punishment for hate crimes law. I'm hopeful it will be passed this legislative session."
The aggravated circumstances bill, also known as the hate crimes bill, was passed by the state legislature last year but vetoed by Gov. Fife Symington April 23. The measure instructed judges to impose harsher sentences on criminals convicted of crimes targeting a person's race, religion, sexual orientation or other enumerated factors. It was identical to bills passed in other states and approved by the U.S. Supreme Court.
Marc Lieberman, the Phoenix attorney who heads the committee pushing the measure, said he is hopeful that changes made in this year's version of the law will ameliorate Symington's concerns.
In his veto letter, Symington said that he worried that the measure would provoke a constitutional review of Arizona's death penalty statutes. Republican lawmakers also expressed concerns that the bill would enable homosexuals to file lawsuits charging discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation. (Gay men and lesbians are not covered under Arizona's civil rights statutes.)
This year's bill adds language that explicitly states that the statute does not create such a right.
The gay community "is not thrilled" by the new language, Lieberman said, "but this is just a political reality at this time in Arizona. They'll have to fight the battle on whether they'll be covered under civil rights law on another day."
Homosexuals were the second-most frequently targeted victims of hate crimes in Phoenix last year, with 20 incidents, according to Chavez.
Jews were the third-most common with 14 incidents; African-Americans were most frequently targeted with 59.
Anti-Defamation League Regional Director Joel Breshin said that the new police squad, which was pushed by Mayor Skip Rimzsa and approved by the city council, "should cause a dramatic decrease" in hate crimes in Phoenix through better investigating. "It's an excellent - and long overdue - move," he said.
In the past, Chavez trained about 35 Phoenix police officers in hate crimes investigations from a variety of investigative squads. But he said problems arose when officers were transferred to other details or took on different responsibilities.
The new squad eliminates the need to constantly retrain and puts investigating officers into their area of expertise, he said.
"This was something the public wanted and we wholeheartedly agreed," he added.
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