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Scholar says FBI counts undercount but reveal reliable trends over decades
Summary
Dr. James Nolan told the California Commission on the State of Hate that FBI UCR/NIBRS collections undercount hate crimes at multiple stages but can reliably show trends; he reviewed bias‑motivated spikes tied to events and urged vigilance to protect federal data collection.
Dr. James Nolan, a sociologist and former FBI crime‑data official, told the California Commission on the State of Hate that official hate‑crime counts understate the true number of incidents but still provide a useful, mostly stable measure for identifying trends.
Nolan, a professor at West Virginia University, outlined the ‘‘assembly‑line’’ of reporting that begins with a victim recognizing and reporting an event and ends with the FBI’s published figures. At each stage he said cases can be lost — victims may not report, officers may misclassify incidents, or technical problems can prevent submission to federal databases. "The FBI undercount the number of hate crimes that occur," he said, adding that the undercount is nonetheless…
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