Jews most victimized group in Toronto: Cop report

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Jun 18, 2007
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TORONTO - The most victimized group in Toronto last year was the Jewish community, followed by the LGBTQ community and the black community, according to the 2014 Toronto Police annual hate crime report.

The report shows the number of reported hate crimes in 2014 increased to 146, up from 131 reported in 2013.

The number of people arrested also went up last year, from 17 arrests in 2013 to 22 arrests in 2014.

Religion proved to be the dominant motivation for almost half of all occurrences — it was identified as the main factor behind 63 of last year’s 146 occurrences.

The most prevalent offences in 2014, according to the report, which was on the agenda for Thursday’s meeting of the Toronto Police Services Board, were mischief to property (93), assault (23), and criminal harassment (10).

The Jewish community was targeted in 44 occurrences, followed by the LGBTQ community (27 occurrences), the black community (20 occurrences), and the Muslim community (16 occurrences).

The report cautioned the statistics “may not be a true reflection of the prevalence” of hate crimes in Toronto.

“The possible reasons for this include victims’ reluctance to report their victimization to police and a lack of awareness of what constitutes a hate/bias crime,” the report said.

Toronto Police spokesman Mark Pugash said it’s impossible to estimate how many people don’t come forward.

“A lot of victims don’t want to come forward for a variety of reasons,” he said.

Len Rudner, of the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, said the number of reported hate crimes in Toronto over the years fall on a “bit of a wavy line.”

“I’m not saying don’t worry about it,” he said. “What I’m saying is don’t be defined by it.”

While the Jewish community enjoys a good rapport with police, that may not be the case for other “relatively young” communities, he said.

It’s important to report a suspected hate crime, Rudner added. “Very rarely do things get better when you ignore them.”


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