Only 3.8% of Hate Crime Reports Authentic: Police Scotland

In the first week of Scotland's new Hate Crime and Public Order Act, Police Scotland received 7,152 reports.

However, only 3.8% of these reports, or 240, were deemed authentic hate crimes.

The remaining reports, including 30 that were not hate crimes, are still being investigated.

The low percentage of authentic reports follows controversy over the justification for the new law.

The text discusses the controversy surrounding a new hate crime law in Scotland, which aims to criminalize hatred towards minority and vulnerable groups.

However, the implementation of the law has been met with misstatements from ministers and misrepresentation from critics.

According to Police Scotland, the majority of reports received during the first week of the law's implementation were anonymous and submitted online.

However, many of these reports were deemed to be spurious and no further action was taken.

Nearly half of the total number of reports were made on April 1, with the daily rate falling significantly in the following days.

This suggests that there may have been campaigns to undermine the act's credibility by submitting large numbers of false reports.

The text reports that while the number of hate crime complaints in England and Wales increased during the week following the announcement of the new hate crime legislation, the number of legitimate complaints remained constant.

The surge caused "minimal" impact on frontline policing and was handled by call-handling centers and hate crime specialists.

The new legislation, which consolidates existing hate crime laws and creates a new offense for threatening or abusive behavior intended to stir up hatred based on age, disability, religion, sexual orientation, transgender identity, and sex characteristics, did not include misogyny for which a separate bill is being drafted.