The Patriot Post® · ALL Murders Are 'Hate Crimes'

Wednesday, as a layup for Joe Biden’s fallacious and pandering assertion that “white supremacists” are the greatest terrorist threat to America — just one of a litany of lies in his droning remarks to a few members of Congress — the Department of Justice filed “hate crime” charges against three Georgia men, accusing them of murdering Ahmaud Arbery. That would be three white men, one of whom shot Arbery, a black man – which is why Biden took his low performing speech victory lap in Georgia.

The Arbery death received little attention at the time it occurred in February of 2020, and when it was picked up by the Demos’ Leftmedia propagandists three months later, it was eclipsed by the death of drug thug George Floyd in May.

Ahead of Floyd’s death, we covered the Arbery case, noting at the time that it was turned over to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation when the Georgia prosecutor who would have handled the case recused himself after declaring the case a “justifiable homicide.” Subsequently, Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr asked for the Department of Justice to take over the case in order to ensure “a complete and transparent review of how the Ahmaud Arbery case was handled from the outset.”

Though a Georgia grand jury did indict the three men, that case will be superseded by the federal case.

I noted in our original analysis of this case, “Given the racially charged nature of this incident now, DoJ should review the case to determine if there is evidence of a ‘hate crime,’ though as I have written previously, all capital crimes are hate crimes, and differentiating crimes by intent serves only partisan political ends.”

Though Arbery had a criminal history known to the man who shot him (who was a former police officer), that was not justification for his death. As I also noted at the time, “Arbery was unarmed, which is to say making a case for the use of deadly force in self defense is unlikely.”

But the key point here is, again, all capital crimes are “hate crimes” — not just those that meet the DoJ’s political standard limiting “hate” to crimes “motivated by bias against race, color, religion, national origin, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity or disability.” That is an absurdly broad standard for classifying “hate,” and I would add that every murder deprives a victim of his or her civil rights.

More to the point is the disparity in how “hate crimes” are covered. As I also noted regarding the Arbery case, there was virtually no political or media outcry regarding another hate crime.

According to the Delaware State Police, on 8 May of last year (while all attention was focused on Arbery’s death), a 29-year-old black man, a “Black Lives Matter” activist, murdered an elderly white couple from Elkton, Maryland, while they were visiting the grave of their son at Delaware Veterans Memorial Cemetery. Lidia Marino, 85, was deceased at the crime scene. Her husband, Paul Marino, 86, an Army veteran, died of his injuries a day later.

According to law enforcement sources at the time, the perpetrator had a scoped rifle and stalked the elderly couple, shot them, and then fired on the first responders. The assailant was killed by police six hour later after a manhunt and gunfight. Despite the fact that a black man targeted and murdered an elderly white couple, the Delaware attack was not even a blip on the mass-media radar.

FOOTNOTE: Regarding so-called “gun violence” and “mass shootings”: For the record, murders of multiple people, particularly mass murders, are very rare in our nation of 330 million people. There were approximately 25,000 homicides in the U.S. in the latest year of record, which you can view state by state, and fortunately there are indications that homicides may be declining after the surge in violence unleashed by Joe Biden and his Democrat agitators in 2020.

The Demos ubiquitously and falsely label the generational murderous contagion they have seeded, “gun violence,” and focus exclusively on the infrequent high-profile “mass shootings,” which account for only a tiny fraction of all homicides. More than 99% of murders in the U.S. are not the result of mass attacks. (Notably, guns don’t commit violence, thugs and sociopaths commit violence.) The oft-cited Gun Violence Archive defines a “mass shooting” as any incident that involves a “minimum of four victims shot, either injured or killed.” The vast majority of those violent attacks are the result of drug and gang violence committed on Democrat-controlled urban centers.

In a country and culture that ignores the rising generation of sociopathic murderers – thugs in violent urban centers who are saturated with cultural violence to the point of glorifying it, it is fortunate that the incidence of mass murder is not ten times higher. Arguably, the only thing keeping that number from being higher is that 125 million Americans are legal and responsible gun owners.

Democrats don’t focus on the vast majority of murders, particularly the epidemic of black-on-black murders on their degraded urban poverty plantations because they want to avoid at all cost, the “inconvenient truth” about race and violence, which is the direct result of failed Democrat social programs. Those murders aren’t useful for the gun control narrative they invoke to evoke emotional reaction from mostly wealthy white suburban women, whom form the Demos’ largest voter constituency.

As for actual mass murders, that is detailed in the FBI’s data on “active shooter incidents” – which it defines as “one or more individuals actively engaged in killing or attempting to kill people in a populated area” – in 2022 the FBI reported 50 incidents resulting in 313 casualties (100 killed and 213 wounded). That number was up significantly from 2020, when the FBI reported 40 incidents resulting in 164 casualties (38 killed and 126 wounded). A more relevant record of “mass shooting” data is maintained by the Associated Press and Northeastern University, which uses the Department of Justice definition of mass public shooting: “A multiple homicide incident in which four or more victims are murdered with firearms.” These numbers fluctuate significantly year over year, and range between 20 and 40 incidents.

FOOTNOTE 2: Regarding why Democrats only focus on less than 1% of murders nationwide – they are intentionally using these rare high-profile tragedies to foment fear – most notably their oft-repeated but erroneous claim that “gun violence is the leading cause of death for children.” If by “children” they mean gang and drug associated murders of those primarily between the ages of 16 and 21, then yes. Democrats are experts at fomenting fear and division.

The fear and angst Demos are intentionally propagating is taking a toll on Americans’ mental health. Psychological researcher Dr. Riana Elyse Anderson observes: “Watching it time and time again on your phone or on the headlines can really impact you in ways that I don’t think we knew before to be as impactful. It’s so ‘in our face’ all the time and we have access to so much footage, so many pictures, so many videos, so many accounts that we’re ingesting it in ways that’s really unhealthy for us.” The result for many mothers is an irrational fear that their children will be shot. That is precisely the fear that Democrats want to perpetuate, especially among their female constituents, in order to advance their gun control agenda.

FOOTNOTE 3: Regarding those so-called “assault weapons,” for much the same reason Democrats focus only on the rare high-profile attacks to generate fear and angst, some of those attacks involve semi-automatic rifles versus pistols, thus the calls to ban them. However, rifles and shotguns of combined are used in less than 3% of all homicides, but Democrats never let facts get in the way of their political agenda.

FOOTNOTE 4: Regarding firearms and violent crime, researcher John Lott reports, “Over 92% of violent crimes in America do not involve firearms.” Again, the only thing keeping that number from being much higher is that 125 million Americans are legal and responsible gun owners.

FOOTNOTE 5: Regarding firearms and suicide, 54% of all deaths involving firearms are suicide, most also involving drugs or alcohol abuse, but the big numbers in “gun violence” reports often do not distinguish between murder and suicide. It would seem that the Demos’ support for assisted suicide is in conflict with their support for gun control.

FOOTNOTE 6: Regarding alcohol v firearm deaths, Demos should ban alcohol because alcohol abuse is far more deadly than firearm abuse. More than 140,000 people died from alcohol abuse last year – that’s SEVEN times the number homicides associate with fire arms. Drunk drivers are responsible for 28 deaths per day. And notably, it is estimated that alcohol is also a key factor in at least 30% of homicides involving a firearm. (Include illegal drug use and that number jumps to about 60%.)

If Democrats are serious about homicides, they should outlaw alcohol. Problem is, the vast majority of alcohol users possess and use it legally and responsibly. Likewise, the vast majority of firearm owners possess and use them legally and responsibly. Enacting a prohibition on firearms is tantamount to enacting a prohibition on alcohol. In both cases, only law-abiding users obey the laws, while lawless users don’t.

Semper Vigilans Fortis Paratus et Fidelis
Pro Deo et Libertate — 1776