The Murderer Was Full of Hate. But Did He Commit a Hate Crime?
DURHAM, N.C. — He hated religion. He hated rule breakers. He hated people who parked in his spot.
The man at the center of a case that caused a worldwide furor four years ago over anti-Muslim violence was filled with so much hate that he shot and killed three of his neighbors, all students of Middle Eastern descent, at his apartment complex in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.
The man, Craig Hicks, 50, is expected to plead guilty on Wednesday and receive three consecutive life sentences for murders that the police initially said stemmed from a parking dispute.
But the case has tested the limitations of the legal system when it comes to the question of when a hateful crime becomes a hate crime. Across the country, reports of bias-based attacks are on the rise, but many such cases that get to
