West Virginia's police departments have a worse record of reporting hate crimes to the FBI than most other states.
According to an Associated Press investigation, about 30 percent of police agencies in West Virginia didn't report hate crime statistics to the FBI from 2009-2014.
Only eight states had a higher percentage of states that don't report the numbers. Mississippi topped the list at 64 percent.
Most of the agencies are small police departments in low-population towns. Some of them say they don't have the money or resources to compile and submit the statistics.
But according to civil rights advocates, who spoke to the Associated Press and the Gazette-Mail, reporting the figures is important.
The Associated Press compiled statistics on police agencies nationwide that do not report to the FBI and found that 2,800 law enforcement agencies throughout the country, equal to 17 percent of agencies, did not report their totals to the FBI from 2009 to 2014.
They spoke to advocates who said the lack of accountability disguises the extent of bias crimes during a time of heightened racial, religious and ethnic tensions, and that more accountability would improve efforts to combat the crimes with more resources and training for law enforcement. The FBI said that even if no hate crimes occur in an area, the police agency should still report the number to show police are taking the subject seriously.
In West Virginia, Jeff Martin, the interim executive director of the state chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, also wants to see the reporting numbers increase.
"It's really important to keep accurate data," he said. "Otherwise you can't really fight something if you don't know what's going on."
However, he also sympathized with smaller law enforcement agencies.
"Obviously West Virginia does have a budget problem," he said. "I'm sure that's trickling down to law enforcement agencies."
Several police chiefs, including Belle Police Chief Darrick Cox, said they have never been asked to report their hate crime statistics.
"I have not ever been asked for any hate crime data from anyone," he said.
State Police spokesman Lt. Michael Baylous said hate crime numbers are part of the information that the agency asks for when it collects annual crime statistics to submit to the FBI. Submitting crime statistics to the FBI, however, is voluntary.
Cox said the agency would submit the data if asked, although he said there had been no hate crimes in his 11 years with the department. He said the agency currently does not submit any crime statistics whatsoever to the State Police and FBI because the agency relies on Kanawha County's computer system and Kanawha County is currently switching to a new system.
"If they notify us and say we're out of compliance with something, by all means we'll make every effort to get into compliance," he said.
Clendenin Police Chief David Brinckman said his department doesn't report because they haven't had any hate crimes, and he didn't recall being asked for that data.
"You have agencies that don't even probably have the computer capabilities to send a report," he said. "I'm not saying that's all of them. When I got here, we had no computer."
As to whether he would submit the data now that he knows the FBI requests it, Brinckman said, "it depends on who's going to skew the numbers.
"A lot of times the statistics are skewed to a certain side," he said. "It depends on who is wanting to use the statistics."
He wouldn't say who he was worried about obtaining the statistics.
Pratt Police also do not report the data.
"One reason is our crime rate isn't as high as the bigger cities," Police Chief Eric Eagle said, "and also the price."
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