Bill Text - HB1462 (2024)

Relative to requirements for reporting hate crimes.


Revision: Dec. 6, 2023, 11 a.m.

 

2024 SESSION

24-2595.1

09/05

 

HOUSE BILL [bill number]

 

AN ACT relative to requirements for reporting hate crimes.

 

SPONSORS: [sponsors]

 

COMMITTEE: [committee]

 

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ANALYSIS

 

This bill establishes reporting requirements for hate-based crimes.

 

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Explanation: Matter added to current law appears in bold italics.

Matter removed from current law appears [in brackets and struckthrough.]

Matter which is either (a) all new or (b) repealed and reenacted appears in regular type.

24-2595.1

09/05

 

STATE OF NEW HAMPSHIRE

 

In the Year of Our Lord Two Thousand Twenty Four

 

AN ACT relative to requirements for reporting hate crimes.

 

Be it Enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives in General Court convened:

 

1  New Section; Attorneys General, Director of Charitable Trusts, and County Attorneys; Reports; Reporting of Hate-Based Crimes.  Amend RSA 7 by inserting after section 37 the following new section:

7:37-a  Hate-Based Crimes; Reporting Requirement.

I.  The attorney general shall direct local law enforcement agencies to report to the department of justice, in a manner to be prescribed by the attorney general, any information that the attorney general deems necessary relative to hate-based crimes.

II.  On or before July 1 of each year, the department of justice shall update the attorney general’s website with the information obtained from local law enforcement agencies pursuant to this section.

(a)  The website posting shall not include names of victims or perpetrators.  It shall include the system-generated number assigned to the incident; the month and year the hate-based crime occurred or was reported; the location and county in which the hate-based crime occurred; the phone number of the reporting agency; the total number of victims; the total number of suspects, including how many are juveniles; the race of the suspects; the most serious crime charged and the category of the crime; the specific bias motivation for the most serious crime charged and the bias category the specific motivation bias falls under; the type of victim associated with the most serious crime; the type of weapon used, if any; and a denotation if the event has more than one type of bias.

(b)  The department of justice shall submit its analysis of this information to the governor, senate president, and speaker of the house of representatives, which includes a summary, patterns, and conclusions, and a detailed accounting of all hate-based crimes.  The first report shall be submitted on or before July 1, 2025.

III.  Local law enforcement agencies shall additionally post the information required in subparagraph I(a) to their websites on a monthly basis.

IV.  For purposes of this section, “hate-based crime” has the same meaning as described in RSA 651:6, I(f).

2  Effective Date.  This act shall take effect July 1, 2024.