Fresno police chief: Low reports of hate crime don’t tell the whole story

Hate crime incidents in Fresno have remained static according to the 2022 report by the state Department of Justice, but Fresno Police Chief Paco Balderrama refuses to relax because of fears that many victims remain hesitant to report such crimes.

Last month, state Attorney General Rob Bonta released the 2022 Hate Crime Report, which showed 13 reported hate crime events and 26 offenses. The numbers were 15 and 19 the previous year.

Balderrama, in his third year leading a force of more than 840 sworn officers, spoke with Vida en el Valle recently about that report and hate crimes in the city.

“The numbers do look low,” said Balderrama. “And when you consider the fact that we received 894,911 calls, and 392,00 required a police response, that’s obviously a very, very small number.”

Tracking the data is important because police can then “make better decisions.”

Balderrama said the statistics represent people who have experienced hate crime or hate speech.

“Hate crimes really focus on individuals and who they are as human beings,” he said, adding that the city’s diversity – ninth in the nation – makes it a challenge to keep hate crimes in check.

“Culture, religion, the color of your skin, and the language you speak is diversity. Every resident of this community deserves to feel safe and secure in their community, and they should never be targeted for how they speak, how they look, what they believe in.”

Convictions for hate crimes is difficult

When a hate crime gets reported, it becomes a high priority for Fresno police. When police get a call regarding hate crime, a supervisor is prepared to contact an investigative unit, said Balderrama.

“We also have resources with our federal partners we can call if we determine that there is a (hate crime) trend that is affecting the community,” he said. “From personal experience, we’re a lot more interconnected at the national level.”

However, Balderrama said it can be difficult to get a conviction.

That doesn’t mean law enforcement isn’t keeping an eye on hate crimes.

“In the last three or four years nationally, law enforcement has placed a higher degree of attention and importance on hate crimes,” said Balderrama.

The FBI has publicized its anti-hate crimes campaign on social media, stating that “hate crimes not only harm victims but also strike fear into their communities. They ask people to call (800) 225-5324.

In May, Gov. Gavin Newsom launched CA vs Hate, a statewide hotline to report hate acts. Within a month, 180 calls were made to (833)-8-NO-HATE.

The California State Library has invested $40 million with media (including Vida en el Valle) to spotlight the impact of hate crimes and educate readers/viewers on the issue and get people to report if they are a victim or witness to a hate crime.

Fresno police joined a Greater Fresno Hate Crime Task Force set up last year by the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California to share hate crime data with other law enforcement groups.

Balderrama applauds those efforts.

“There’s been a lot of information flowing out through the media to the community,” he said. “So the reporting of such crimes has been steadily increasing, not by much, but at least we know that the information and knowledge is getting out there.”

A problem with underreporting

Despite those informational campaigns, hate crimes remain unreported, according to officials.

“I know it is underreported without a doubt for many reasons when you consider diversity in our community,” said Balderrama.

“People who come here from other countries sometimes don’t have much trust or confidence in the police that they are going to do their jobs or that they’re here to protect.”

Balderrama said immigrants may mistakenly think that police should be called only “when it’s something very, very serious.” Or, he said, they don’t see a threat worth bothering the police.

The police chief stresses that all hate crimes and hate speech be reported to police, “for them to have confidence in their police department to report it.”

Language is not a barrier, he said. “A lot of our police speak Spanish, Punjabi and Hmong,” said Balderrama. “We strive to meet their needs.”

Even if the case does not result in a charge being filed, Balderrama said “gathering the information and figuring out what’s going on in the community really helps us to diminish fears.”

Balderrama fears what could happen if an alleged hate crime gets shared on social media with “just partial or even incorrect” information.

“It’s shared once, twice, 100 or 1,000 times, and all of a sudden you have a certain segment of the population that’s living in fear based on misinformation,” said Balderrama. “When they report it to the police, we can figure out what’s really going on and typically diminish the fears of the community.”

It’s the police’s job, he said, to sort out misinformation.

Immigrants can be easy targets

Balderrama, who grew up in El Paso and later joined the Oklahoma City police force, said immigrants are vulnerable targets because they tend to not speak English “or know how to get around or know where the resources are.”

“In Oklahoma City, a lot of Mexican American laborers were being targeted because they do not use banks. A gang was going through apartment complexes, particularly on Fridays, because they knew that they had just gotten paid,” he said.

“A lot of the people would be robbed and assaulted because they would have a large amount of cash on them.”

Balderrama said it is difficult to prove those cases against the Mexican American workers were a hate crime.

“For us to be able to say with 100% certainty that the motivation was based on religion or race or nationality or the language they speak, that’s not easy to do,” he said.

That Fresno County prosecuted seven hate crimes in 2022 is proof of that difficulty, he said.

“They are hard to prove,” he said. “This last year in Fresno, we’ve had some incidents that have occurred at churches, and certain protected classes have been the victims of these crimes.

“Unless you have a suspect, you can almost never determine if hate was the motivation. Unless there’s a note left or unless there’s derogatory speech left on graffiti, then we can make that assumption.”

It’s important to have people trust the police, he said, so that hate crimes can be reported.

“We want to make sure that they feel confident they can trust us when they call that we’re going to respond,” said Balderrama.