Across the nation, there has been an increase in violence against the homeless. A report out this week called Hate, Violence and Death on Main Street USA, from the National Coalition for the Homeless and the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty highlights these recent trends. Here’s a few excerpts and facts from the report:
- Homeless persons are particularly vulnerable to violent attacks when they are living outside in public spaces. Most of our communities do not have adequate affordable housing or shelter space to meet the need, leaving many homeless persons forced to live outside. In fact, according to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, 44% of our homeless population is unsheltered.1 Without proper action to deal with the crisis of homelessness as a whole, our homeless neighbors will continue to be vulnerable to brutal attacks.
- Many attacks against homeless persons go unreported and are thus are likely many times higher than the actual numbers presented here.
- Since 1999
- 774 violent acts have been perpetrated against homeless individuals across the country in a variety of communities.
- These attacks occurred in 235 cities throughout our country, in 45 states and Puerto Rico.
- 217 homeless people have been killed, as a result of attacks ranging from being beaten to being set on fire and other atrocious acts.
- Throughout 2007,
- 160 homeless persons were violently attacked and
- 28 of those 160 persons were killed as a result of those attacks
- The number of attacks in 2007 rose from the number of attacks in 2006:
- The total number of attacks rose by 13% from 2006 to 2007 – from 142 attacks to 160 attacks.
- The number of attacks resulting in death rose by 40% from 2006 to 2007 – from 20 deaths to 28 deaths.
- The number of non-lethal attacks rose by 8% from 2006 to 2007 – from 122 non-lethal attacks to 132 non-lethal attacks.
- The perpetrators of these violent attacks against homeless people tend to be younger men or boys. The majority of crimes were committed by teens and youths as young as ten-years-old. Of the known attackers in 2007,
- 64% were youths between age 13 and 19;
- An overwhelming 86% of the accused and convicted were 25 and under;
- Some of the attackers repeatedly cited their motive of attack as boredom, committing the crimes for the “thrill” or “fun,” because the victim is homeless, or perhaps even more harrowing, because they simply “can.”
You can quickly scan the first 30 or so pages of the report and get quite a bit of information from charts and graphs, I’d encourage you to check it out.
All of this recent local backlash against the homeless makes me wonder . . . what messages are we sending our kids and will it make it more likely that something like is happening throughout the nation start happening here? I sure hope not!
