Denmark

How hate crime data is collected

The Danish National Police has monitored hate crimes since November 2015. Monitoring activities provide knowledge about the extent of hate crimes, of developments in the area, and enables accurate processing of cases.

The Danish National Police has national hate crime registration guidelines. When recording a crime, a police officer has to register case details, as well as a short description of the case. While bias motivation is not recorded, keywords are used to track hate crimes in the police database.

Police officers identify hate crimes by interviewing the victim and/or witnesses. They also take the crime scene into account. Police officers ask open questions about the victims' (and the witnesses') perception of the motive. The police officers must also be aware of physical characteristics of the victim and the offender. If the victim suspects they were subject to a hate crime, police officers must take this into account. If police officers suspect a hate crime, even though the victim has not mentioned it themselves, they must try to get the victim to elaborate. Police officers must be unprejudiced and make the victim feel as comfortable as possible.

All criminal cases are registered in the Danish Police case management system, POLSAS. The Danish National Police includes cases that are:

1. Motivated by racism, including: a. Nationality/ethnicity, b. Race/skin colour, c. Other;

2. Motivated by religious beliefs, including a. Christianity, b. Judaism, c. Islam, d. Buddhism, e. Hinduism, f. Other religious beliefs and congregations;

3. Motivated by sexual orientation, including a. Homosexuality, b. Transvestism (and transsexual), c. Other. The subcategory 'Transvestism' includes victims who have been targeted because of their gender identity and/or their gender expression.

The Danish National Police monitors hate crimes in its system using keywords. The keywords method was developed for the caseworkers to use when registering hate crimes in POLSAS.

The Danish National Police also monitors 'incidents without charges and other investigative measures' with a bias motivation. In addition, the Danish National Police monitors hate speech, which is a criminal offence according to section 266b of the penal code.

The Ministry of Justice conducts an annual victimization survey. In this survey, victims who report that they were subjected to violence are asked whether they think the violence was motivated by, for example, racism or sexual orientation.