Sacramento County hate crimes highest since 2003: ‘Horrible, despicable, way too frequent’
Law enforcement officials reported 78 hate crimes in Sacramento County during 2021, triple the number that occurred in 2020 and more than any other year since 2003, new state data shows.
Twenty-six of the crimes were classified as anti-Black, according to the California Department of Justice. Twenty-two were anti-LGBTQ. Ten were anti-Asian. The rest were a mix of other biases.
Pastor Mark Meeks of City Church of Sacramento in Oak Park said he’s surprised the number of reported hate crimes wasn’t higher last year. He believes the increase is a symptom of a deeper systemic problem: people have become more and more isolated, and the COVID-19 pandemic just exposed the hate produced by a fractured society.
“It just revealed kind of the underlying issues,” Meeks said. “It’s like you took the sheet rock off and you really saw all the termites behind it. They were always there.”
Many of the crimes were serious. Seventeen were classified as aggravated assaults, and another 16 were classified as simple assaults. Four crimes involved arson. Four involved robbery.
Alexis Sanchez, director of advocacy and outreach at the Sacramento LGBT Community Center, said the recent spike is “just a snapshot,” and many hate crimes go unreported in the county.
Sanchez believes there is an obvious correlation between the rise in hate crimes and the growing number of people nationwide joining right-wing extremist groups in the wake of the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. She said these groups are anti-Black, anti-LGBTQ, and antisemitic.
These extremist groups use social media to target groups, Sanchez said, such as the group of hateful protesters who this summer tried to force entry into a Woodland bar where a drag event was canceled due to increased threats of anti-LGBTQ violence.
“It’s a pattern of escalating rhetoric and violence,” Sanchez said. “But we have to show up to counter-protest to protect marginalized groups. We all need each other.”
She said the center receives numerous requests for help from hate crime victims; some don’t want to go to police because they’re afraid they won’t be taken seriously.
Sanchez and others at the community center direct hate crime victims to police online reporting tools or connect them with attorneys; anything to get the legal process started to obtain a protective restraining order.
“To help you pursue some kind of justice in whatever form you can get it,” Sanchez said.
Antisemitic vandalism
The most common type of hate crime reported, however, was vandalism or destruction of property, which accounted for 27 incidents.
In the past year, schools, places of worship and even a golf course in Sacramento County were defaced with antisemitic vandalism.
Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg said each of these incidents seem to embolden others to commit similar acts of white supremacy. In early September, the mayor gathered community groups and elected leaders to denounce images of a swastika found on a classroom wall at Sacramento State University and along J Street near the campus entrance.
“When this happens, we have to speak up, we have to speak out and we have to be vigilant,” Steinberg said. “We have to educate, we have to constantly remind each other that they can only win if we’re silent.”
In late August, the UC Davis Police Department launched an investigation after antisemitic banners were displayed on a campus overpass. Earlier this month, maintenance crews found a large Nazi swastika and an antisemitic slur carved into a putting green at the Cherry Island Golf Course operated by Sacramento County.
Bruce Pomer, president of the Jewish Federation of the Sacramento Region, said hate groups are proliferating with unfiltered hate speech spreading on social media, putting once considered fringe extremist groups under the glare of mainstream media.
“This speech is horrible, despicable and way too frequent,” Pomer said. “They’ve grown. They’ve gotten bold because more of it is out there.”
Twenty-three of the reported hate crimes took place on streets or highways. Eighteen happened in homes. Five were in churches, five were in supermarkets and three were at schools.
Fifty-seven of the 78 hate crimes in 2021 were reported by the Sacramento Police Department. The Sacramento Sheriff’s Department reported 10 hate crimes.
On Oct. 4, a man later identified as Nicholas Wayne Sherman, placed plastic food storage bags containing “Aryan Nations” flyers on doorsteps of homes and at nearby Deterding Elementary School in Carmichael, according to the Sacramento District Attorney’s Office. Weeks later, Sherman taped paper to a menorah and metal fence at the Shalom le Israel Messianic Synagogue with anti-Jewish wording and photos of Nazi leader Adolf Hitler, prosecutors said. Sherman was later arrested, convicted and sentenced for those crimes.
Despite the increase in reported hate crimes, few criminals faced hate crime prosecutions last year.
First, some suspects weren’t caught. Second, prosecutors often didn’t file hate crime charges.
Sacramento County prosecutors filed four cases as hate crimes in 2021, equivalent to 21% of the 19 instances when law enforcement referred hate crimes to them. No other California District Attorney in counties with at least 15 hate crime referrals in 2021 filed a lower percentage of bias-related crime cases. Prosecutors statewide filed 285 cases as hate crimes, equivalent to 47% of the cases that law enforcement referred to them as motivated by bias.
Hate crimes in Yolo, Placer and El Dorado counties
Yolo County also saw a rise in reported hate crimes. Yolo County officials reported 21 hate crimes, more than any other year in at least two decades. Like Sacramento County, few of the crimes were actually prosecuted as hate crimes. The Yolo County District Attorney filed one case as a hate crime out of the 12 bias-related crimes referred to the office.
Placer County officials reported seven hate crimes, down from 10 in 2020. The Placer County District Attorney filed one case as a hate crime.
El Dorado County officials reported one hate crime in 2021, down from five in 2020. El Dorado prosecutors did not file any hate crime charges last year.
Hate crimes reported last year in California were the sixth-highest ever recorded and the highest the state has seen since the aftermath of the September 11 terrorist attacks.
The state Department of Justice has collected and reported statewide data on hate crimes since 1995. Hate crime data has historically been underreported, and justice officials say they recognize that data may not adequately reflect the actual number of hate crimes that occurred in the state.
The spike in hate crimes could be the result of more people willing to report it, but it’s more likely just a product of the political rhetoric that has stained California’s history of diversity, said Omar Altamimi, policy and advocacy coordinator at the Sacramento Valley/Central California office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations.
“Whatever political faction it may be, when people feel empowered they take action,” Altamimi said about hate crimes. “It’s so powerful. And with everyone being stuck at home, you get caught in this echo chamber online that validates these disgusting and very sickening beliefs.”
