The Manhattan District Attorney’s office currently has 103 hate crime cases on its docket. That’s an all-time high caseload, according to an office official.
Citywide, hate crimes increased in the first quarter of this year by 76%, from 110 crimes during January and April of last year, as compared to 194 during the same period this year, an April report from the New York City Police Department Hate Crimes Task Force indicates.
The number of hate crimes against members of the Asian American and Pacific Islander communities first spiked nationwide in 2020 as perpetrators projected pandemic biases. In Manhattan, through October 7 of this year, 28 out of 69 reported hate crime cases were found to be anti-Asian motivated, data from the district attorney’s office indicates. In 2021, 32 out of 74 cases were also determined to be motivated by the same bias and many of the perpetrators are walking free.
“There are many passive aggressive actions which cannot be defined by law as hate crime,” said Susan Lee, a former city council candidate who is Asian American. “Recently, I was shoved hard by a man in a shopping center. There was no rush in the shop that it could happen by accident. I believe the motivation was hatred, but I cannot report it as hate crime,” she said.
Lee said she was also pushed down a staircase at the World Trade Center subway station last year. “I could not accuse the person of racial hate because he was mentally ill and houseless,” she said. “But since the incident, I have not traveled in the subway. It is very difficult for Asians to live under constant fear of discrimination.”
Of the city’s five boroughs, Manhattan reported the highest number of anti-Asian hate crime incidents in 2021, according to a study from the Asian American Bar Association, a group that support the legal interests of the Asian American community. Also according to the study, Times Square saw one of the highest number of attacks against Asian Americans last year.
Elsewhere in Midtown, a 28-year-old man was charged with a hate crime by the Manhattan District Attorney earlier this year after he attacked Asian women in seven different incidents in a two-hour span. The attacks took place on Madison Avenue, Fifth Avenue at East 30th Street, in the Flatiron District near Park Avenue South, on Irving Place near East 17th street and in Union Square East.
In a separate incident over the summer, a 57-year-old female was kicked in the hip on West 16th Street and the perpetrator made anti-Asian statements, an NYPD report indicates. As of last week, the department was still searching for a person of interest and the Hate Crimes Task Force was investigating, according to a press release.
As the number of hate crime cases rise, the conviction rate remains low. Of 233 anti-Asian incidents reported in the city during the first three quarters of last year, only seven resulted in conviction, the Asian American Bar Association study indicates.
“The reason for the low conviction rate is because all racial hate crimes cannot be proven in the court of law. Some acts like teasing and passing remarks lack evidence that they were motivated as racial hate,” said Robert Lee, executive director of Asian American Arts Centre, a Chinatown nonprofit that looks to address concerns of Asian Americans.
The Manhattan District Attorney’s office echoed this. “The prosecutors are bound by the law and the facts of a particular case. If we can’t prove a hate crime beyond a reasonable doubt, then it is our ethical duty to not charge it as such,” said spokesperson Kay Nguyen.
To help combat the problem, the city invested a record $1.7 million in the office’s Hate Crimes Unit. With the new funds, Nguyen said the expanded office will not only be able to investigate and prosecute hate crimes but it will also be able to provide enhanced outreach and advocacy to help victims.
“To tackle the racial hate crimes which lack evidence or an eyewitness, the unit will work with experts and dig deep in the accused’s social media handles to analyze if there was motivation for racial hate,” said Nguyen. The unit has already used some of the funding to hire two investigators who speak Cantonese, a trial preparation assistant, an Asian American Pacific Islander victims’ services counselor and an LGBTQ+ advocate.
Some think the funding is not enough. “Just an allocation of more funds is not a resolution to combat hate crimes but how the funds are utilized is important,” said Bethany Li, legal director with the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund.
“The root cause of this violence is structural racism and that needs to be addressed,” said Li, adding, “it is required that we have more engagement with community-based organizations working on the ground, including ethnic studies in schools and more resources towards issues like mental illness and poverty which as a result will decrease the chances of violence.”
Lee also emphasized the importance of education in combating hate crimes. “Apart from children, adults should be educated with Asian history and importance of culture. We need to have information and awareness out there that the coronavirus is not created in China,” she said. “I am an American too.”