x
Breaking News
More () »

More hate crimes reported nationwide, in Tennessee

"We're all created the same no matter what our background is, where we come from, where we're going to... we're all created the same. We need to treat each other with respect."

Hate crimes of all kinds are on the rise.

The FBI's latest hate crime statistics report from the Uniform Crime Reporting Program states the number of hate crime incidents reported to them in 2017 was up about 17 percent from the year before.

In 2017, 7,175 hate crimes were reported.

In 2016, 6,121 were reported.

The FBI says about 1,000 more agencies shared their hate crime reports in 2017 than the year before.

Almost 60 percent of these crimes were based on racial bias.

A hate crime is defined as "a crime motivated by racial, sexual, or other prejudice, typically one involving violence."

"Language that you shouldn't be using associated with violence, that's when you cross the line and you have a hate crime," said Monroe County Sheriff Tommy Jones.

This new report had us thinking, how many hate crimes have been reported in Tennessee?

A TBI report from April showed us Tennessee is following the national trend, seeing an uptick in reported hate crimes.

"I feel like a lot of victims, too, now feel like they can come forth, they can make a report, they know they'll be taken care of and it will be investigated," said Jones.

In Tennessee, 199 hate crimes with a known bias and 133 with an unknown bias were reported in 2017.

Out of the 133, 49 of those unknown bias hate crimes were reported in Carter County in the Tri-Cities area.

The second highest number came from our area.

Twelve of the reported hate crimes came from Monroe County, much to the surprise the sheriff.

"How in the world did they ever get this listed as a hate crime," he said while looking at one of the reported cases.

Jones explained if there are any signs of crimes being a possible hate crime, they're put in the initial report.

"As the detectives get involved and they investigate the case then they find out that it's truly not a hate crime," he said.

That was the case with each of the 12 cases reported to TBI, but the sheriff's office didn't update the reports until Tuesday.

"The detectives division, they're going to work on clearing the cases," said Jones.

He said they take all reports seriously are will be more diligent with updating once they are done investigating.

Jones is glad those crimes were not hate crimes after all.

"We're all created the same no matter what our background is, where we come from, where we're going to... we're all created the same," he said. "We need to treat each other with respect."

Jones said education is key when it comes to preventing hate crimes.

If an offense is categorized as hate crime, and punishment on the initial crime is escalated.

Before You Leave, Check This Out