VIRGINIA — During the past five years, the number of hate crimes in Virginia has increased.
In 2017, white nationalists attacked 20-year-old Deondre Harris in a parking garage in Charlottesville while a white supremacist rally was taking place. He had an injury to his spinal cord and a broken arm. Harris had to get eight stitches in his head.
Just last month, someone vandalized The Jewish Community Center of Northern Virginia. Surveillance footage showed a masked man spray-painting 19 Swastikas across the building.
“There certainly appears to be a rise in hate crimes, especially in Virginia,” said Steve Foster, a former FBI agent who spent a lot of time investigating those types of crimes.
Data from Virginia State Police shows hate crimes based on race have increased in recent years. In 2016, there were 64 in Virginia. Last year, that number jumped to 89. That's an increase of almost 40 percent.
Other forms of hate crimes also went up, including those against the Jewish community. In 2017, anti-Semitic crimes nearly tripled from the year before that.
In almost every category, 2017 had the largest number of hate crimes since 2013. Foster said he believes social media is fueling them.
“We’re a global world these days, and we're connected all over the world through technology and social media and the Internet,” said Foster. “That technology has brought us closer together, and it's also brought together evil ideas, and evildoers now have the opportunity to exchange information and ideas and to encourage one another.”
The FBI and local police departments have been trying to get ahead of the curve by looking out for threats made on social media.
Steve Drew, Chief of the Newport News Police Department, said recent hate crimes in Virginia and across the country have led his officers to increase their online monitoring.
“No longer can we take it as someone playing a joke or 'it's just words.' Words have meaning, and words can lead to action, and we have to always be prepared for those things,” Drew told 13News Now.
Although his department has increased its efforts to prevent hate crimes from happening, he said police only can do so much.
“It is very difficult to know what is in the mind of an individual without having some information that was provided to law enforcement by family, or friends, or coworkers,” said Drew.
For Foster, the rise in acts of hate signals one thing.
“What it says to me -- and what I think it might be saying to the rest of these people in this country -- is we’re not getting along. This American Dream is not working.”