Religiously Aggravated Offending in Scotland 2013-14

3. FINDINGS

Number of charges

3.1 There were 587 charges with a religious aggravation reported in 2013-14. This is a 15% decrease since 2012-13 when there were 689 charges reported to COPFS. This is also the lowest level of religiously aggravated charges reported to COPFS since 2004-05 when 479 charges were reported shortly after the legislation was introduced. Table 1 below shows a breakdown of the charges reported to COPFS between 2007 and 2014.

Table 1: Charges reported to COPFS between 2007 and 2014

	2007-2008	2008-2009	2009-2010	2010-2011	2011-2012	2012-2013	2013-2014
Number of charges	609	668	633	694	898	689	587

3.2 These trends may have been influenced in the last two years by the separate use of charges under section 1 of the Offensive Behaviour at Football and Threatening Communications (Scotland) Act 2012. This legislation, which came into force on 1 March 2012, criminalises religious hatred that is connected to football and may be used instead of section 74 legislation (religiously aggravated charges) in certain circumstances. There were 48 additional 'religious' charges^[13] under this legislation during 2013-14. When all legislation is considered (i.e. when section 74 charges are added to the section 1 and 6, offensive behaviour at football and threatening communications, charges) there is a total of 635 charges relating to religious prejudice in Scotland in 2013-14 (a 17% decrease on the corresponding figure in 2012-13 when there were 764 'religion' charges, and a 29% decrease since 2011-12 when there were 898 religious charges under section 74).

3.3 COPFS statistics are based on a live database and therefore the figures reported in Table 1 do not exactly match those previously published in COPFS and Scottish Government reports. The database may change; for example if the Procurator Fiscal amends a charge the database will only hold details of the amended charge. The comparisons in the remainder of this report are based on the total number of charges that were analysed and included in the past reports for 2010-11, 2011-12, and 2012-13 by the Scottish Government at the time that research was carried out.

3.4 Before providing further details of these charges, it is worth highlighting that these charges do not relate to 587 separate incidents. Many of the incidents which took place involved more than one accused, and/or more than one breach of the law, and will therefore have resulted in more than one charge. The bulk of the analysis in this report relates to 'charges' rather than to separate incidents that were reported by the police to COPFS.

Sex and age of the accused

3.5 For 2013-14, 90% of the charges related to male accused. Table 2 shows the age breakdown of the accused for each of the 587 religious aggravation charges. The proportion of charges for accused aged between 16 and 30 has reduced from 58% in 2011-12, to 48% in 2012-13 and 47% in 2013-14.

Table 2: Age breakdown of the accused

	2010-11		2011-12		2012-13		2013-14
Age	Number of charges	%	Number of charges	%	Number of charges	%	Number of charges	%
<16	24	4	5	0.6	12	2	0	0
16-20	143	21	178	20	105	15	83	14
21-30	257	37	331	38	229	33	191	33
31-40	120	17	184	21	173	25	133	23
41-50	98	14	118	14	116	17	114	19
51-60	32	5	41	5	37	5	57	10
>60	17	3	18	2	15	2	9	2
Unknown	2	0.3	1	0.1	0	0	0	0
Total	693	100	876	100	687	100	587	100

Note: Percentages may not add to 100 because of rounding. Location of charges

3.6 Table 3 shows the local authority areas where charges occurred. There remains a strong focus of charges in Glasgow, which accounted for 35% of charges. This is however a decrease from 2012-13, when Glasgow accounted for 41% of all charges. The number of charges per 100,000 people has also reduced in Glasgow from 60 in 2011-12, to 47 in 2012-13 and to 35 in 2013- 14.

3.7 Apart from the concentration in Glasgow, there were relatively high numbers in North Lanarkshire, Falkirk and Edinburgh City. This higher prevalence is also evident when controlling for population density. The remaining charges were spread throughout local authorities, with most of them having between 5-20 charges each year.

3.8 There were two local authorities where no charges occurred (Eilean Siar/Western Isles and Orkney Islands).

Table 3: Local authority- area where the charges occurred 2011-2014^[14]

	2010-11			2011-12			2012-13			2013-14
Local authority area	No. of char-ges	%	Char-ges per 100,000 pop.	No. of char-ges	%	Char-ges per 100,000 pop.	No. of char-ges	%	Char-ges per 100,000 pop.	No. of char-ges	%	Char-ges per 100,000 pop.
Aberdeen City	9	1	4	16	2	7	7	1	3	7	1	3
Aberdeenshire	0	0	0	5	1	2	6	1	2	1	0.2	0.4
Angus	1	0.1	1	4	1	4	0	0	0	5	1	4
Argyll & Bute	7	1	8	21	2	24	9	1	10	6	1	7
Clackmannanshire	2	0.3	4	12	1	24	8	1	16	4	1	8
Dumfries & Galloway	5	1	3	19	2	13	13	2	9	11	2	7
Dundee City	4	1	3	9	1	6	5	1	3	7	1	5
East Ayrshire	2	0.3	2	20	2	17	11	2	9	9	2	7
East Dunbartonshire	1	1	1	2	0.2	2	8	1	8	7	1	7
East Lothian	0	0	0	2	0.2	2	7	1	7	6	1	6
East Renfrewshire	5	1	6	5	1	6	10	2	11	4	1	4
Edinburgh City	22	3	5	48	6	10	32	5	6	36	6	8
Western Isles	0	0	0	1	0.1	4	2	0.3	7	0	0	0
Falkirk	30	4	20	41	5	27	48	7	31	41	7	26
Fife	9	1	2	18	2	5	11	2	3	12	2	4
Glasgow City	356	51	60	353	40	60	281	41	47	208	35	35
Highland	5	1	2	9	1	4	2	0.3	1	9	2	4
Inverclyde	12	2	15	14	2	18	3	0.4	4	7	1	9
Midlothian	2	0.3	2	2	0.2	3	2	0.3	2	4	1	5
Moray	1	0.1	1	4	1	5	4	1	4	3	1	3
North Ayrshire	16	2	12	23	3	17	8	1	6	14	2	10
North Lanarkshire	78	11	24	84	10	26	95	14	28	66	11	20
Orkney Islands	0	0	0	1	1	5	2	0.3	10	0	0	0
Perth & Kinross	3	0.4	2	9	1	6	10	2	7	6	1	4
Renfrewshire	16	2	9	33	4	20	11	2	6	14	2	8
Scottish Borders	7	1	6	1	0.1	1	0	0	0	3	1	3
Shetland Islands	0	0	0	1	0.1	5	0	0	0	4	1	17
South Ayrshire	10	1	9	8	1	7	3	0.4	3	20	3	18
South Lanarkshire	33	5	11	42	5	14	28	4	9	21	4	7
Stirling	10	1	11	22	3	25	21	3	23	24	4	26
West Dunbartonshire	12	2	13	27	3	30	14	2	16	12	2	13
West Lothian	35	5	20	10	1	6	24	4	14	16	3	9
Outside Scotland	0	0	13	0	0	0	0	1	0.1	0	0	0
Unknown	0	0	0	10	1	-	1	0.1	-	2	0.3	-
Total	693	100	13	876	100.0	17	687	100.0	13	587	100.0	11

Locus of charges

3.9 As Table 4 shows, 177 charges (30%) took place in a 'main street'^[15] in a town or city centre. Just under a fifth (19%) of all charges occurred in a police car/station; a 17% decrease from 2012-13. The proportion of charges taking place in domestic dwellings increased from 70 (10%) to 99 (17%).

3.10 There was a decrease in the proportion of charges that took place in residential areas compared with 2012-13: from 126 (18%) to 85 (15%). There was also a decrease in the number of charges which took place at football stadiums: from 27 charges (4%) in 2012-13 to 16 (3%) in 2013-14. A lower proportion of charges also occurred on public transport or at a public transport station from 5% in 2012-13 to 3% in 2013-14.

3.11 Seventeen charges related to online social media including Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and other online forums, were recorded in 2013-14. This represents a decrease from 30 charges reported in 2012-13.

Table 4: Locus of charges

	2010-11		2011-12		2012-13		2013-14
Locus	Number of charges	%	Number of charges	%	Number of charges	%	Number of charges	%
Police car/station	134	19	199	23	159	23	113	19
Main street	145	21	175	20	153	22	177	30
Residential area	82	12	162	19	126	18	85	15
Domestic dwelling	66	10	97	11	70	10	99	17
Football stadium	90	13	67	8	27	4	16	3
Public transport	91	13	60	7	27	5	16	3
Pub/club	37	5	33	4	32	6	24	4
Hospital/ambulance	12	2	23	3	15	2	15	3
Social media	-	-	-	-	30	4	17	3
Place of Worship	-	-	-	-	6	2	7	1
Other	46	7	71	8	64	9	18	3

Note 1: Charges do not always add up to the total number reported because an incident may fall into more than one locus type, for example a public transport station outside a football stadium.

Note 2: In 2010-11 and 2011-12 the number of charges relating to online social media were included in the domestic dwelling figures.

Note 3: Before 2012-13 the locus 'place of worship' was included in 'other'. Comparisons of this category should therefore be made with caution.

Timing of charges

3.12 Chart 1 outlines the peak days of the week and times of the day that incidents took place. There were typically spikes in religiously aggravated offending between 16:00 and 20:00 on weekdays. There were larger spikes at weekends, particularly on Fridays and Saturdays between 20:00 and 00:00.

Chart 1: Day of Week and Time of Day

Football, marches and parades

3.13 The analysis included looking at the number of religious aggravation charges that were related in some way to football or marches/parades. This included, for example, if the incident took place at a football match or screening, or at a march or parade, or if the police noted the relevance of a football association within the description of the incident^[16]. Again, this finding is based on the information recorded in police reports and may under-report the links to football and marches/parades if the police did not note this.

Table 5: Charges linked to football and marches/parades

	2010-11		2011-12		2012-13		2013-14
	Number of charges	%	Number of charges	%	Number of charges	%	Number of charges	%
Football	231	33	267	31	109	16	96	16
Marches/ parades	32	5	18	2	85	12	34	6

3.14 Under section 74, there were 96 charges linked to football in 2013-14 (16% of the total). This is a decrease since 2012-13 when there were 109 charges, however it is a similar proportion of charges that were linked to football.

3.15 Within the 96 football-related charges under section 74, 16 occurred at a football stadium^[17]. The other football-related charges took place in settings such as public transport, domestic dwellings, main streets in town and city centres, on social media, and in residential areas.

3.16 The Offensive Behaviour at Football and Threatening Communications (Scotland) Act 2012 was introduced on 1 March 2012. The Act criminalises offensive behaviour related to football, including offensive singing or chanting, where it is likely to incite public disorder. Some of the charges that might, before this time, have been dealt with under section 74 of the Criminal Justice (Scotland) Act 2003, may from this date have been dealt with under the new legislation.

3.17 Under this legislation there were an extra 48 religious charges that were related to football in 2013-14. In total, there were 144 football-related charges reported to COPFS that contained religious prejudice, when both section 74 (religious aggravation charges) and the relevant parts of the offensive behaviour at football legislation are considered.

3.18 This is a 22% decrease in the comparable figure since 2012-13 when there were 184 football-related charges containing religious prejudice.

3.19 Also, as shown in table 5, there was a decrease in the proportion of charges relating to marches and parades from 12% (85 charges) in 2012-13 to 6% (34 charges) in 2013-14. This figure was reduced from 2012-13 when a single event at an anti-Islamic demonstration in Glasgow had 57 charges associated with it.

Religious beliefs/affiliations that were targeted

3.20 Information about the nature of the religiously offensive conduct was taken from the police report of the incident. There is no separate section within police reports that states which religious belief, in the reporting police officer's view, was targeted. An assessment was made by the researchers involved in this work about the religion that appeared to be targeted, based on the police description of the incident and the details about what was said or done by the accused. The religious beliefs or affiliations of the accused or the victims of the incident are not formally recorded by the police as they are not relevant to the definition of the crime in the law. This report does not therefore present definitive information about the religious beliefs or affiliations of the people targeted by the offensive conduct.

3.21 Table 6 below shows there was a 5% decrease in the number of charges where conduct was derogatory towards Roman Catholicism: from 388 charges in 2012-13 (57% of the total) to 367 charges in 2013-14 (63% of the total). There was a 15% decrease in the number of charges with conduct derogatory towards Protestantism, from 199 in 2012-13 (29% of the total) to 169 in 2013-14 (29% of the total).

3.22 There was a decrease in the number of charges where conduct was derogatory towards Islam, from 80 charges^[18] (12% of the total) in 2012-13 to 48 charges (8% of the total) in 2013-14. Charges for conduct derogatory towards Judaism also decreased from 27 charges (4% of the total) in 2012-13 to 9 charges (2% of the total) in 2013-14.

Table 6: Religious affiliation that was the subject of offensive conduct

	2010-11		2011-12		2012-13		2013-14
Religion targeted	No. of char-ges	% of total char-ges	No. of char-ges	% of total char-ges	No. of char-ges	% of total char-ges	No. of char-ges	% of total char-ges
Roman Catholicism	400	58	509	58	388	57	367	63
Protestantism	253	37	353	40	199	29	169	29
Islam	15	2	19	2	80	12	48	8
Judaism	16	2	14	1	27	4	9	2
Christianity (general)	4	1	3	0.3	5	1	4	1
Unknown	8	1	2	0.2	4	1	5	1
Other	0	0	0	0	3	0.4	2	0.3

Note: Charges do not add up to the total number reported as some charges related to conduct that targeted more than one religious group.

Victims

3.23 Information about the people targeted by the religious aggravation is not

separately recorded in the police report and for the purpose of this analysis the researchers made an assessment of the victims, based on the police description of the incident. The victim was defined as the main target for the religiously offensive part of the charge. This may have been a member of the public, police officer or other worker or it may have been the general community, for example if someone was singing a religiously offensive song that was not directed at anyone in particular. Each charge may have included multiple victim 'types'.

3.24 As shown in Table 7, the police were again the most common target of religiously-aggravated offending in 2013-14. Since 2012-13, there has been an increase from 273 charges where police were victims to 282 in 2013-14 (a proportional rise from 40% to 48%). These charges often relate to incidents where the police arrested the accused for a separate charge (which may not have involved religious prejudice) and were then abused in religiously offensive terms afterwards. The general community (e.g. people who happened to be in the vicinity, but who were not directly targeted by the accused) were victims in around a quarter of the charges. There was a decrease in the number (though not the proportion) of charges relating to members of the public from 172 charges in 2012-13 to 161 charges in 2013- 14 (25% to 27%). There was also a decrease in charges where workers were the victims: from 80 charges in 2012-13 to 65 charges in 2013-14 (12% to 11%). The 'workers' category includes hospital staff, security staff, taxi drivers, and religious officials^[19]. Seventy-three percent of the charges included victims that were police officers, the general community, and workers. This suggests that for the majority of charges it is unlikely the accused knew the religious affiliation/belief of the victim at the time of incident, and that the attacks were arbitrary in nature.

Table 7: Victims of religious aggravation

	2010-11		2011-12		2012-13		2013-14
Victim	Number of charges	% of charges	Number of charges	% of charges	Number of charges	% of charges	Number of charges	% of charges
Police	288	42	449	51	273	40	282	48
Community	229	33	259	30	231	34	155	26
Member of public	157	23	271	31	172	25	161	27
Worker(s)	73	11	117	13	80	12	65	11

Note: Charges do not add up to the total number reported because some charges related to behaviour that targeted more than one victim or victim type.

Alcohol and drug-related charges

3.25 Table 8 shows that the accused was described by the police as being under the influence of alcohol in 345 charges (59% of the total) in 2013-14, an increase from 333 charges (49% of the total) in 2012-13. This finding is based on the information recorded in police reports, therefore may under-report the alcohol links to the offending if there were charges where the police did not note that the accused had been drinking. It was also not possible to quantify the amount of alcohol consumed in any given case.

3.26 Drug-related charges refer to incidents where the police reported the accused as possessing drugs or suspected they had taken drugs before the charge. In 2013-14 these accounted for 28 charges (5%), a decrease from 2012-13 when there were 60 charges (9%) related to drugs.

Table 8: Alcohol and drug-related charges

	2010-11		2011-12		2012-13		2013-14
	Number of charges	%	Number of charges	%	Number of charges	%	Number of charges	%
Alcohol	424	61	498	57	333	49	345	59
Drugs	41	6	75	9	60	9	28	5

Note: Some charges may have included both drink and drugs.

Main charges

3.27 Table 9 shows a breakdown of the main charges that aggravations were

added to. It shows a trend of decreasing numbers of religious aggravations of the common law charge of 'breach of the peace', a decrease in aggravations related to the statutory charge of 'act in a racially aggravated manner'. Figures for the statutory charge of 'threatening or abusive behaviour' (under section 38 of the Criminal Justice and Licensing (Scotland) Act 2010), rose to a similar figure from 2011-12 following a dip in 2012-13.

Table 9: Main charges that the religious aggravations were added to

	2010-11		2011-12		2012-13		2013-14
Main charge	Number of charges	%	Number of charges	%	Number of charges	%	Number of charges	%
Breach of the peace	503	73	365	32	134	20	68	12
Threatening or abusive behaviour	99	14	414	47	385	56	416	71
Assault	39	6	35	4	26	4	34	6
Offensive behaviour at football	-	-	N/A	N/A	35	5	14	2
Threatening communications	-	-	N/A	N/A	4	1	2	0.3
Act in racially aggravated manner	-	-	N/A	N/A	61	9	4	0.7
Other	52	8	62	7	42	6	49	8
Total	693	100	876	100	687	100	587	100

Note: Percentages do not add up to 100 due to rounding.

Note: These main charges refer to the main charges as initially cited, they may have changed during the court proceedings.

Note: The charge 'Act in a Racially Aggravated Manner' comes under the Criminal Law (Consolidation) (Scotland) Act 1995 and is intrinsically racial, however a religious aggravation may be added where appropriate.

3.28 Table 10 shows a breakdown of the main charges by religion. There was a broadly similar proportional spread in the charges for breach of the peace and threatening or abusive behaviour given for offences against Roman Catholicism and Protestantism. However, there was a different profile for charges including other religions, notably Islam, where there was a much smaller proportion of charges that were breaches of the peace.

Table 20: Breakdown of main charges in 2013-14 by religion

Main charge	Catholicism		Protestantism		Islam		Judaism		Christianity (General)
	Charges	%	Charges	%	Charges	%	Charges	%	Charges	%
Breach of the Peace	41	11	25	15	2	4	2	22	1	25
Threatening or abusive behaviour	263	72	124	73	32	67	7	78	2	50
Assault	22	6	9	5	2	4	0	0	0	0
Offensive behaviour at football	11	3	2	1	0	0	0	0	0	0
Act in racially aggravated manner	0	0	0	0	3	6	0	0	0	0
Other	30	8	9	5	9	19	0	0	1	25
Total	367	100	169	100	48	100	9	100	4	100

Note: The charge 'Act in a Racially Aggravated Manner' comes under the Criminal Law (Consolidation) (Scotland) Act 1995 and is intrinsically racial, however a religious aggravation may be added where appropriate.

Court proceedings 3.29 The COPFS publish an annual report on hate crime in Scotland. This provides more detail on the outcomes of these charges and can be found at http://www.copfs.gov.uk/publications/equality-and-diversity. As explained in this report, court proceedings were commenced in 89% of charges with a religious aggravation, a slightly higher proportion than in 2012-13 when proceedings were commenced in around 82% of charges.

3.30 Many cases are on-going and information about final convictions will be presented in Scottish Government 'criminal proceedings' publications^[20]. Provisional information from the COPFS case management database shows that court proceedings had been concluded for 280 of these main charges. Of this number 238 (85%) charges resulted in convictions. As shown in table 11 the most common disposal recorded was a monetary penalty (39%) similar to 2012-13. A community penalty was given for 72 charges (30%), an increase from 2012-13. Custody was the disposal for 57 charges (24%), similar to 2012-13. Other^[21] disposals were recorded for the remaining 16 charges (7%).

Table 11: Recorded disposals

	2010-11		2011-12		2012-13		2013-14
Disposal	Number of charges	%	Number of charges	%	Number of charges	%	Number of charges	%
Monetary penalty	163	42	217	43	104	40	93	39
Community penalty[22]	99	25	110	22	61	23	72	30
Custody	70	18	103	20	60	23	57	24
Other	58	15	75	15	37	14	16	7
Total	390	100	505	100	262	100	238	100