Interesting "Hate Crime" Opinion

Interesting "Hate Crime" Opinion

Various laws are described as providing higher punishment for hate crimes, but they generally don't focus on whether the defendant hated people with a particular identity. Rather, they focus on whether the defendant committed the crime at least in part because of the target's identity. Often that will stem from hatred or other identity-based hostility, but not always. An excerpt from the long U.S. v. Ritter, decided last week by the Fourth Circu…