During 2000 and 2001 numerous incidents where persons were assaulted or harassed because of their race or sexual orientation occurred in and around the City of Valparaiso. As a result of a variety of disagreements about these incidents, then Mayor David Butterfield and then Valparaiso University President Alan Harre asked the Valparaiso University Community Research and Service Center (CRSC) to help identify the issues and work towards some consensus as to what should be done. As part of the initial investigation it was clear that there was disagreement among residents as to the extent and nature of the problem. For example, there were questions about:

          1. How many similar incidents have occurred in the area?

          2. What kinds of incidents have occurred?

          3. Where have these incidents occurred?

          4. Who are the perpetrators and who are the victims?

          5. Are these incidents becoming more frequent?

          6. Are these incidents becoming more severe?

What is a Bias Motivated Incident?
     The first step was to define precisely what was meant by an “incident.” A bias motivated incident is defined by the anti-defamation league as “behavior which constitutes an expression of hostility against the person or property of another because of the victim’s race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, or ethnicity/national origin.” Bias motivated incidents are more inclusive than hate crimes. A hate crime, according to the FBI, is “a criminal offense committed against a person or property which is motivated in whole or in part, by the offender’s bias against race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, or ethnicity/national origin.” The key difference between the two is that one is a criminal offense (hate crime) and the other is an expression of hostility (bias incident), but may not reach the level of criminal activity. This project includes incidents that are both hate crimes and bias motivated incidents.

Methods
     There are numerous ways to identify bias motivated incidents in a community. After a good deal of investigation and recommendations from several sources, it was decided to focus on incidents reported in local newspapers. Initially The Times Online was the exclusive source, but more recently we have included the Post Tribune. Both of these papers can be searched online and go back to January 1990 to the current date. A lengthy list of key words and phrases such as cross burning, swastika, racial slurs, vandalism, Ku Klux Klan, hate crime, racially motivated, etc., has been developed and these are entered into the search engines of these newspapers in an attempt to find articles about bias motivated incidents.
      When an article is discovered that contains one of the key words or phrases, it is carefully read to determine if the story actually is about a bias motivated incident. Incidents are selected for inclusion in this report if the action described in the article conforms to our definition of a bias incident; that is, did the incident include behavior that was an expression of hostility against a person(s) or property of another because of the victim’s race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, or ethnicity/national origin. In making this judgment, several persons read the account of the event and each independently determines if the event fits the definition. In order for the event to be included, there needs to be agreement from three researchers that it did fit our definition and is, therefore, a bias related incident. Once the event is determined to be a bias motivated incident, its location, date, a brief description, the particular characteristics of the victim(s) and the perpetrator(s), and an assessment of the severity of the incident are recorded. When compiled, this information allows a determination of the frequency and location of each incident, and in some instances, the characteristics of the victim(s) and perpetrators, the purpose of the attack, and its severity.
      Incidents are then put on an interactive map which is included here. Each incident’s location is indicated by a marker on the map. When you click on the marker a brief summary of the incident appears. In all of the articles found in the Times on line, if you click on the brief description of the incident, it will bring up the original article about the incident. Incidents included only in the Post Tribune do not have this latter feature because the Post Tribune is accessed by a paid search service and protected by copyright.

Types of Incidents
       There were a wide variety of types of activities included among these incidents, but they all seemed to fall into the following seven general categories.

1. Cross burning: Incidents in this category include crosses put on the victim’s property. On some occasions the crosses were lit on fire and on others they were not.

2. Swastika graffiti: Incidents in this category include swastika(s) spray painted somewhere either on a residence, other building or public property.

3. Graffiti: general spray-painting/defacing of private or public property with bias-related symbols or slogans.

4. Bias Motivated Harassment: Incidents in this category include any physical and/or verbal harassment except murder. Shouting racial slurs at a person or assaulting an individual are examples. These included different types of public demonstrations such as protests, picketing, and rallies.

5. Bias Motivated Murder: This category includes all murders and attempted murders.

6. Property Damage: Damage of property, i.e. vandalism, motivated by bias.

7. Ku Klux Klan Activity: These include Klan rallies, distribution of Klan materials, and Klan related violence.

8. Violent Assault: Incidents in which one party physically attacks another with bias-related motivations.

9. Discrimination: Unfair treatment of a party in housing, workplace, etc., motivated by bias.

Determining severity
     After careful examination of each incident an assessment is made of the severity of the incident. Each incident is given a number on a scale from 1-5, with 1 being the least severe and 5 the most. As an example, one of the incidents was given a 5 because it included a racially motivated murder. On the other end of the extreme, an incident was given a 1 that included racial slurs painted on a building. In this case, it appeared to be an isolated incident not directed at anyone and there was no direct physical violence to a person.
     Despite these procedural safeguards it is clear that any such classification system has shortcomings. Obviously there is no way to assess the psychological distress or emotional strain that the incident inflicts on the victim. For example, an incident such as a spray painted swastika may not come out as severe on our scale as a burning cross on someone’s lawn, even though the psychological ramifications may be the same. Needless to say, more work needs to be done in this area. We simply offer this as a place to begin and hopefully others can suggest methods to refine this analysis.

Limits of the Data
      We readily admit there are difficulties in relying on newspaper accounts of these events, but the intent is simply to look at what events are reported in the newspapers with the full understanding that many such events do not make the newspaper, and that the meaning of these reported events is the subject of some debate. Until more sophisticated reporting of these events is developed, these data provide at least one indicator of the extent of bias motivated incidents in Northwest Indiana.

Guide to Using Maps and Web Page
      Incidents: If you are interested in a list of all the incidents from 1990 through July 1, 2011, click on the INCIDENTS link above. This contains recent incidents in 2011 not included in other data.
     Figures: If you are interested in an analysis of the incidents by various categories and time, click on the FIGURES and it will give you that data from 1990 through 2010.
     Maps: If you want to see where the incidents have occurred, click on MAPS. You will have several options and you will be able to look at all the incidents, or separate them by year or by type of incident.