Aligning police practice with hate crime theory: The case for using risk assessments to improve police response to victims of hate

In England and Wales, police forces have been urged to improve their response to victims. Despite this, many victims continue not to report to police, and those that do often report distrust and dissatisfaction with police response. Across the hate crime strands, victims have little confidence in the capacity of police to act empathetically, to respond to hate crime effectively, or to take hate crime victimisation seriously. In this paper, we argue that risk assessments (RAs) represent a useful tool to bridge the gap between the reality of hate crime victimisation and current practice. We suggest that RAs – tools designed to assess a victim’s risk of potential future victimisation – can not only help the police to implement safeguarding but also provide a fuller understanding of the impact and harms of hate crime, so that police have a more holistic perspective. The use of RA may ensure that victim perspectives remain at the centre of police response.