In most serious cases, the hate crime is considered to be a criminal offense. When a person is charged with a crime, they are called “the accused” and the criminal charges are examined in criminal proceedings.
Aggravating circumstances
In Croatia, the Criminal Code defines hate crime as a criminal offence committed on account of a person's race, colour, religion, national or ethnic origin, disability, gender, sexual orientation or gender identity. Unless a more severe punishment is explicitly prescribed by that Code, such conduct shall be taken as an aggravating circumstance. This means that due to the committed hate crime, the person is charged with such criminal offense as, for example, murder, bodily harm or property damage, but during the trial the court can take into account the aggravating circumstances, namely, the bias motive, when adopting the decision. In general, aggravating circumstances can be applied to all crimes, established in the Criminal Law.
example A person with a dark skin has been attacked and seriously harmed with a biased motive due to the person’s race.
However, the court can also not take into account the aggravating circumstances but recognize that in addition to the particular offense committed, as, for example, bodily harm, the person has also committed another crime, namely, public incitement to violence and hatred.
Public incitement to violence and hatred
If a person has committed a crime with a motive to publicly incite to violence and hatred based on national, ethnic, racial or religious hatred or enmity, it may be charged with two (or more) criminal offenses simultaneously: for the “base” offense done, for example, murder, bodily harm or property damage, and also for public incitement to violence and hatred which is a substantive criminal offense, too. In such situation, aggravating circumstances are not additionally considered.
important The competent authorities and court have to thoroughly evaluate each hate crime case individually in order to decide whether it had a bias motive as an aggravating circumstance or whether it had a motive to trigger hatred in society.
example A person with dark skin has been attacked and seriously harmed with a motive to incite racial hatred in society.
Hate speech
Hate speech is not a hate crime, as it has a different structure from it. Unlike hate crime, hate speech does not have the element of the “base offence”. That means, if the hate speech would not contain the bias or intolerance motive, there would be no criminal offence to be punished, only an expression of a person.
However, hate speech and hate crimes have certain similar characteristics, namely, both are motivated by hatred or intolerance against individuals or groups based on certain attributes. Sometimes during the hate crime, perpetrator may also publicly express hate or violence based on the victim’s ethnicity, religion or other characteristics. Thus, in Latvia hate speech is often mentioned by public authorities and individuals in the context of hate crimes and sometimes categorized as a hate crime.
The Criminal Code distinguishes public incitement to violence and hatred as a substantive criminal offence. For hate speech to be considered a criminal offence, it must fit the description of public incitement to violence and hatred outlined in Article 325 (1) of the Criminal Code.
Read more about hate speech and the differences between hate crimes and hate speech.