Homeless Face Hate Crimes After Killings in LA and NY: Expert Warns
Three random killings in New York City and Los Angeles, all allegedly committed by homeless men, have ignited a wave of fear and animosity. But experts say unhoused people are more likely to be victims than perpetrators of violence.
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Three random killings in New York City and Los Angeles, all allegedly committed by homeless men, have ignited a wave of fear and animosity, but experts argue that unhoused people are more likely to be victims of violence than perpetrators, reports the Associated Press.
In Los Angeles, for example, while homeless people were suspects in 43 of the city’s 397 homicides (11 percent) in 2021, they were victims more than twice as often, suffering 90 fatalities (23 percent) in the same time span. The frequency of cases where a homeless person was killed has risen every year since 2017, when it was 10 percent.
The murder of a homeless person receives scant attention, while the killings in which they are the alleged suspects often garner headlines. Eric Tars, legal director for the National Homelessness Law Center, said labeling all homeless “as people we should be afraid of, rather than have compassion for, actually sets them up for hate crimes and vigilante violence and other mistreatment.”
Los Angeles Police Chief Michel Moore said authorities need to focus on supportive housing rather than law enforcement. While mental illness has not been specifically linked to any of the attacks, at least 20 percent of the country’s homeless population, including nearly a quarter of California’s unhoused residents and 17 percent of New York’s, has a severe mental illness, according to a January 2020 count of homeless people by HUD.
Additional Reading: Advocates Sound Alarm about Dramatic Spike in Violence Against Homeless, The Crime Report, Jan. 22, 2022
