WINSTON-SALEM – The United States Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of North Carolina (USAO-MDNC) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) hosted their second anti-hate crime forum today in Winston Salem, announced United States Attorney Sandra J. Hairston.
The Federal government’s Hate Crime Statistics Program began in 1990 to monitor hate crimes and enhance the federal response to crimes motived by bias against race or ethnicity, religion, disability, sexual orientation, gender, or gender identity. The United Against Hate program, launched in 2022 by Attorney General Merrick Garland, aims to increase reporting on hate incidents as well as hate crimes so that law enforcement can identify patterns and trends in their communities and protect victims. The Department of Justice-wide initiative is also designed to educate the community about how to report hate crimes, what resources are available to them, and offers a chance for community members to meet with the USAO and the FBI to learn more about what the Justice Department is doing to reduce hate crime incidents nation-wide.
If you or someone you know has been the victim of a hate crime, you can report the incident directly to the FBI by submitting a tip to the FBI online https://www.fbi.gov/tips or by calling your local FBI field office https://www.fbi.gov/contact-us/field-offices. In the event of an emergency, individuals should always contact 911 first.
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