Content uploaded by Sergey Katsuba
Author content
All content in this area was uploaded by Sergey Katsuba on Feb 07, 2023
Content may be subject to copyright.
Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at
https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=uvao20
Victims & Offenders
An International Journal of Evidence-based Research, Policy, and
Practice
ISSN: (Print) (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/uvao20
The Decade of Violence: A Comprehensive Analysis
of Hate Crimes Against LGBTQ in Russia in the Era
of the “Gay Propaganda Law” (2010–2020)
Sergey Katsuba
To cite this article: Sergey Katsuba (2023): The Decade of Violence: A Comprehensive Analysis
of Hate Crimes Against LGBTQ in Russia in the Era of the “Gay Propaganda Law” (2010–2020),
Victims & Offenders, DOI: 10.1080/15564886.2023.2167142
To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/15564886.2023.2167142
© 2023 The Author(s). Published with
license by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.
Published online: 06 Feb 2023.
Submit your article to this journal
View related articles
View Crossmark data
The Decade of Violence: A Comprehensive Analysis of Hate
Crimes Against LGBTQ in Russia in the Era of the “Gay
Propaganda Law” (2010–2020)
Sergey Katsuba
Sutherland School of Law, University College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland
ABSTRACT
The research builds on the previous ndings on the number of hate
crimes against LGBTQ in Russia before and after the introduction of the
so-called “gay propaganda law” in 2013 and signicantly enriches
them. The previous research studied hate crimes between 2010 and
2016 and was limited to using 2 databases of court decisions. The
current research expands both the timeframe and the use of sources: it
analyzes such crimes across 11 years (2010–2020) while adding 2 new
databases of court rulings to achieve more comprehensive results and
generate more accurate statistics of violent acts against LGBTQ in
Russia. The previous research identied 263 cases of hate crimes,
which was not sucient to generate accurate statistics and indicated
a trend only. The results of the current research signicantly expand
the existing knowledge by identifying 1056 hate crimes committed
against 853 individuals including 365 fatalities. The greater number of
cases enabled the current research to present a more thorough
descriptive analysis of the crimes committed against LGBTQ in
Russia. The paper introduces 3 main categories of hate crimes
(Premeditated attacks, Not premeditated attacks, and the so-called
“Gay panic defense” cases) and establishes that the number of cases
when LGBTQ victim was purposefully selected and targeted grew
substantially across the decade. The overall number of victims
increased by three times after the introduction of the “gay propaganda
law” in 2013 – from 34 in 2010 to 138 in 2015 and remained at
relatively the same level for the remaining of the decade.
KEYWORDS
Hate crimes; LGBTQ rights;
discrimination; violence
Introduction
The level of hate crimes against LGBTQ is on the rise in Russia. This issue is closely
connected with the introduction of the so-called “gay propaganda law” in 2013 (Federal
Law No. 135-FZ “On amendments to certain legislative acts of the Russian Federation in
order to protect children from information, promoting the denial of traditional family
values”). This legal act introduced fines for “promoting non-traditional sexual relation-
ships,” ranging from 5000 to 50,000 RUB for individuals (100 to 1000 EUR in 2013) and
1,000,000 RUB for organizations (20,000 EUR in 2013). The definition of “promotion”
adopted by the law is vague, leading to its interpretation by the Russian law enforcement
and judiciary being very broad. The law has raised questions among legal experts regarding
CONTACT Sergey Katsuba sergey.katsuba@ucdconnect.ie Sutherland School of Law, University College Dublin,
Belfield, Dublin 4, Ireland
VICTIMS & OFFENDERS
https://doi.org/10.1080/15564886.2023.2167142
© 2023 The Author(s). Published with license by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://
creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided
the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way.
its foreseeability and potential arbitrary enforcement (Fenwick, 2019; Johnson, 2015). Some
examples of cases to which the law was applied include fines for actions such as waving
a rainbow flag (“My freedom defends yours” 2014); public discussion of homosexuality
(The Economist, n.d.); screening of gay-themed movies (Znak.com, n.d); and providing
psychological help to homosexual individuals through support groups (Luhn, 2015). This
legal act has a presumably focused nature – it is specifically aimed at protecting the rights of
the child. However, it can be seen from the case law that the implementation is not that
specific. The case law is so diverse that the only pattern that can be observed is the
restriction of positive or neutral expressions pertaining to LGBTQ (negative expressions
are not restricted). Therefore, “gay propaganda law” represents a blanket ban, a symbolic
message to the LGBTQ community. This can be illustrated by the words of Valery Zorkin,
Chairman of the Russian Constitutional Court: “The legal meaning of this ban is not so
much to solve the problem of promoting homosexuality among minors – frankly, this
problem is not yet acute in Russia – but to outline an understanding of the deviating nature
of this type of behavior” (Zorkin predlozhil izmenit osnovopologayushiye documenty
OON, 2014). Therefore, the question arises regarding the potential consequences of the
adoption of legislation that is designed in such a way.
The dangerous discriminatory nature of the law in question has been outlined by the
European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR, the Court). In 2017, in Bayev and Others
v Russia, the Court found that the “gay propaganda law” is in violation of Articles 10 and
14 of the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR) as it infringed on both freedom
of expression and the prohibition on discrimination (Bayev et al. v. Russia, 2017). The Court
further elaborated that there will be potential negative outcomes of such laws: “By adopting
such laws the authorities reinforce stigma and prejudice and encourage homophobia which
is incompatible with the notions of equality, pluralism, and tolerance inherent in
a democratic society” (§ 83). Despite the decision of the ECtHR, the law was never repealed
and was actively implemented. Moreover, in 2022, after Russia progressed into a more
developed state of authoritarianism, new legislation was proposed introducing new restric-
tions, related to “gay propaganda” and equalized homosexuality and pedophilia (Prinyaty
zakonoproekty o zashite traditsionnykh tsennostey, 2022). Thus, the situation around insti-
tutionalized discrimination against LGBTQ in Russia continues to deteriorate.
The connection between discrimination (by way of imposing a discriminatory legal act)
and the level of violence against the marginalized group(s) was discussed in literature
(Allport, 1954; Glick, 2005; Herek, 2007; Kondakov, 2019; Mason, 2001; ODIHR, 2009;
Perry, 2001). The previous research (Kondakov, 2019) developed a method of statistics
collection on anti-LGBTQ hate crimes in Russia, generating unique data that is not being
reported by the Russian authorities. The research however was restricted in the use of
sources and the timeframe which produced limited results. The current research is employ-
ing the original methodology with more extensive use of databases and an expanded
timeframe that covers 11 years in order to generate more accurate statistics to answer the
question regarding the level of violence against LGBTQ in Russia. The result is an extensive
database of homophobic violence and hate crime incidents in Russia. Since the number of
cases identified in the current research is greater it allows an additional analysis of the types
of crimes, based on different criteria. Therefore, there are two main research questions for
the current paper: what is the level of hate crimes against LGBTQ in Russia before and after
2S. KATSUBA
the introduction of the “gay propaganda law” (2010–2020), and what are the types of the
crimes committed?
In order to elaborate on that, the paper will cover the following. First, I will situate the
research in the context of homophobic violence in Russia. Second, I will introduce theore-
tical concepts of hate crimes in connection with discrimination and the legal framework for
hate crimes in Russia. In doing so, I operationalize the definition of a hate crime that will be
used in this research. Third, I will elaborate on the methodology of the current research and
how it builds on the previous research. Finally, I will present the results of my analysis and
the statistics on hate crimes against LGBTQ in Russia.
The context of homophobic violence in Russia
The choice of the decade 2010–2020 is not accidental, coincident with a rise of repressive
legal mechanisms in Russia that aimed to restrict freedom of expression. Such laws apply to
a variety of different actions related to the public expression of opinions and are predomi-
nantly justified by the need to preserve public security and morals. Throughout the third
and the fourth presidential terms of Vladimir Putin (2012 – currently), the implementation
of such legal acts increased. This was taking place in concert with a turn to “traditional
values” (Wilkinson, 2014), the rhetoric of nationalism, and the formation of the author-
itarian regime. In 2010 Russia was classified as a “Hybrid regime” and placed in 107th place
in the world’s democracy index, while in 2021, it was put in the “Authoritarian” category in
124th place (“Democracy Index 2021,” n.d.). The introduction and active implementation
of repressive legal mechanisms are in line with the process of autocratization and together
with the rhetoric of nationalism, it brings about negative consequences, one of which is
violence against particular groups.
The “gay propaganda law” is one of the restrictive legal acts that are the product of the
decade of autocratization. It has a distinguishing feature – unlike other legal mechanisms
that restrict freedom of expression, “gay propaganda law” is designed in a discriminatory
manner. The ECtHR’s Bayev case is the only case where the Court has found a violation of
Article 10 of the ECHR (freedom of expression) in conjunction with Article 14 (prohibition
of discrimination in the exercise of Convention rights). The Court observed that “the
legislation at hand stated the inferiority of same-sex relationships compared with opposite-
sex relationships < . . . > [and] embodied a predisposed bias on the part of the heterosexual
majority against the homosexual minority” while the Government did not offer “convincing
and weighty reasons justifying the difference in treatment” (Bayev et al. v. Russia, 2017,
para. 90). Despite the decision, the law in question is still being actively enforced – in 2013–
2021 there have been 117 cases of implementing the “gay propaganda law,” 36 of them
resulted in convictions (Danniye Sudebnoi Statistiki, no date). This provides an opportunity
for the research to explore the potential negative outcomes that the law in question brings to
the marginalized group.
Where can the potential negative effect mentioned by the ECtHR be observed? The
introduction of the discriminatory legislation and the discourse surrounding it potentially
affected public opinion on LGBTQ. After 2013 the attitudes toward homosexual people
became significantly more negative. In 2021 Levada Center published a report on “The
attitude of Russians to the LGBT Community.” The most common attitude among the
population is “disgust or fear” (38% in 2021 compared to 21% before 2013), at the same time
VICTIMS & OFFENDERS 3
the proportion of people who are indifferent almost halved (26% in 2015 compared to 45%
before 2013). The majority of people deny the right to enter same-sex relationships (68% in
2021). This is a representation of a hostile environment that is partially created by the
introduction of the “gay propaganda law” (“The attitude of Russians to the LGBT commu-
nity,” no date).
What is the evidence that discriminatory legislation increases the level of violence against
marginalized groups? Past research on the number of hate crimes against LGBTQ in Russia
is very limited. Official sources do not report such crimes. There are 4 main sources of data:
an international organization (OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human
Rights – ODIHR), 2 Russian NGOs (LGBT Initiative Group Stimul, SOVA Center), and
an academic research project (Kondakov, 2019). Each of them provides data on hate crimes
against LGBTQ which is helpful in understanding the context but not enough to provide
sufficient statistics of such crimes and thorough analysis. This research gap will be bridged
by the current paper.
ODIHR provides a database on hate crimes in the member states, releasing this data
every year on the 16th of November – International Tolerance Day. The data is provided by
the Russian civil society organizations that are involved in monitoring violence and
statistical analysis. There are 7 organizations in total that contributed to those reports by
submitting their data to ODIHR separately.
1
The incidents that are included in the reports
are further divided into 3 categories: “violent attacks against people,” “attacks against
property” and “threats.” The database contains a brief outline of the incident (e.g., A gay
man was subjected to homophobic insults, threatened, beaten and electrocuted by police
officers) and the name of the NGO that reported the incident to ODIHR. At the moment
(Aug 2022) reports are available for 5 years (2016–2020), which is not enough to trace the
influence of the “gay propaganda law” which was adopted in 2013. Moreover, the data does
not seem to be consistent (attacks against property were only reported in 2016 and one
more incident in 2020, threats were not reported in 2016; Figure 1; Russian Federation |
HCRW, no date).
As for the sources within the country, there are 2 NGOs that regularly publish such data.
LGBT Initiative Group Stimul published reports on homophobic violence and discrimina-
tion. This NGO employed 4 types of sources – their own records, messages from govern-
ment agencies, news media articles, and social media posts. The incidents they reported
include violent attacks (including targeting and dating violence) and threats. The data is
published in their yearly reports and is somewhat reliable – descriptions of sources are
included in the reports. Currently, only 4 reports are available (2017–2020; Figure 1), which
is not enough to make conclusions about the influence of discrimination on the level of
violence.
Another NGO – SOVA Center has been one of the most consistent and reliable sources
of information on hate crimes in Russia. Instead of publishing yearly reports, they maintain
an open-access database of hate crimes. The database includes anti-LGBT crimes for the
longest period of time (2007–2021; Figure 1). The data is not categorized, every incident is
accompanied by a short description and a link to the source (usually a media piece). This
data does suggest a considerable increase in the number of crimes from 2013 onwards,
which can be attributed to the influence of the “gay propaganda law” (SOVA Center for
Information and Analysis, no date). However, the data is not systematic and potentially
biased. The method that was employed by SOVA Center included monitoring media
4S. KATSUBA
sources. Therefore, only hate crimes that received media attention were spotted by this
NGO and included in their statistics. The method employed by the current research
mitigates this constraint by accessing criminal cases that were unseen by the media.
The three sources that I mentioned above are useful in order to gather insights regarding
the level of violence against the LGBTQ. However, they do not make connections between
the number of hate crimes and discrimination against the group. There has been an
academic attempt to gather statistics on hate crimes – Kondakov (2019) studied hate crimes
against LGBTQ in Russia over the course of six years (2011–2016; Figure 2). Unlike the
NGOs, this piece of research is not concerned about the media sources or a combination of
different sources – it is focused on court rulings only. This work attempts to analyze all
available court decisions related to LGBTQ and identify those that can qualify as hate
crimes. In this case, the statistical data will not be limited to only the cases that appear in the
media.
This data represents a general trend rather than the most reliable numbers on hate crimes
due to a very conservative approach chosen by the researcher. However, there is an issue
with the 2 databases used in this research – Pravosudie and RosPravosudie. The former does
not include court decisions from the most populous region of Russia – the city of Moscow
(which significantly undermines the results of the research), the latter was discontinued and
is not available after 2018. The current research mitigates this problem by adding 2 private
databases. The original research indicated a trend only due to a limited number of cases and
did not allow categorization – the only one that is provided is based on the type of the
criminal offense as it is stated in court judgments (Larceny, Violence, or Homicide). The
current research with the extended timeframe and use of databases managed to identify
more cases of hate crimes, which allowed a more thorough descriptive analysis of the
crimes.
Figure 1. Number of hate crimes according to 3 different reporting bodies.
VICTIMS & OFFENDERS 5
As can be seen, the existing sources of data on hate crimes against LGBTQ in Russia are
limited. The reports provided by the ODIHR and LGBT Initiative Group Stimul do not
cover the timeframe before the introduction of the “gay propaganda law.” The data in the
open-access database of SOVA Center is not systematic and includes only the incidents
reported by the media. The previous research project (Kondakov, 2019) does provide
reliable data but is limited in the use of sources and in its timeframe, which did not allow
it to produce a detailed analysis and generate enough cases of hate crimes. The current
research significantly enhances the existing knowledge by employing the reliable method of
data collection to generate more accurate statistics.
Hate crime as a continuation of the process of marginalization of the
out-group
For the purpose of the current research, the concept of hate crime available in legal
literature needs to be reviewed and a definition needs to be operationalized. In the following
two sections, I will discuss the concepts of hate crime, and potential connection to
discrimination, and how they were developed by different authors. I will illustrate how
the concepts progressed into documents of international organizations and national legisla-
tion. Finally, I will operationalize the definition of hate crimes that will be used for the
purposes of the current research.
The connection between discrimination (by way of imposing discriminatory legislation)
and violence is more apparent if they are considered to be parts of the same progression.
Figure 2. Number of hate crimes against LGBT (Kondakov, 2019).
6S. KATSUBA
This stream in the literature begins in the post-WWII discourse in social psychology that
was focused on explaining the nature of prejudice and its connection with discrimination
and violence. Allport scale of the manifestation of prejudice in society (1954) shows how
verbal rejection (hate speech, negative images of out-group), progresses into discrimination
(excluding members of the group from certain types of social privileges, disadvantaging the
out-group by preventing them from achieving goals), and finally to physical attack and
extermination. It is also suggested that on this scale, discrimination (by way of imposing
a discriminatory legal act) is a decisive step in the transition between verbal rejection and
violence, a condition that is required to “remove the normal brakes that exist between verbal
aggression and violence < . . . > while many people would never go all the way from
antilocution to violence, it is true that activity on one level makes the transition to a more
intense level easier” (Allport, 1954, p. 58).
One example of this progression is the connection between the political discourse of anti-
Semitism that enabled the discriminatory Nuremberg Laws which “made the subsequent
violence and burning of synagogues seem natural” (Allport, 1954, p. 57). A similar progres-
sion has been observed in Russia with the events surrounding the “gay propaganda law.”
First, the verbal rejection of the LGBTQ was described by Healey (2017) and Eremin and
Petrovich-Belkin (2022) who analyzed the formation of the negative public discourse on
LGBTQ in Russia in the early 2000s and an increasing number of legal initiatives concern-
ing the “protection of morals” between 2004 and 2010 as well as Sleptcov (2018) who
described the discourse of political homophobia as a state strategy in Russia. Second,
discrimination through legal means began with a number of regional laws that preceded
and made it easier to enact the federal/national “gay propaganda law” (Johnson, 2011). The
rise of violence followed immediately after, it was recorded in the following year
(Kondakov, 2019, p. 952). Finally, the increase in the level of violence led to consequences
such as the infamous “gay purges” in Chechnya in 2017 – systematic authorized persecution
of LGBTQ in the region that resulted in around 100 people being detained on suspicion of
being gay and at least 3 dying (Novaya Gazeta, 2017). Another wave of “gay purges”
happened in late 2018 when 40 people were detained and 2 killed (Russian LGBT
Network, 2019). Therefore, the idea of a progression from verbal rejection to discrimination
to violence that is elaborated in literature is very relevant for the current research.
The Allportian idea of a progression of prejudice is shared and expanded upon by more
contemporary authors. Staub (1996), Perry (2001), Mason (2001), and Herek (2009) con-
sider hate crimes to be not isolated events but systematic symbolic acts of bias-motivated
violence, which grow naturally as extensions of racism, sexism, and homophobia. Herek
(2009) explains this line of argument as follows: “anti-gay violence is logical, albeit extreme
extension of heterosexism – an ideological system that denies, denigrates and stigmatizes
any non-heterosexual form of behavior, identity, relationship or community.” This is
closely connected with the distribution of power – to ensure that sexual minorities have
less power, the heterosexual assumption is promoted and homosexual behavior is labeled as
abnormal, unnatural, nontraditional, and deviant. This status serves to make “legitimate
hostility, discrimination, and even aggression against sexual minorities” and becomes
a foundation for individual manifestations (which can be for example, behaviors expressing
stigma, including violent acts; Herek, 2009, p. 67). Perry elaborates that this progression is
made possible by constructing the relative identities of both offender and victim “by
simultaneously asserting one and subordinating, if not annihilating another” (Perry, 2001,
VICTIMS & OFFENDERS 7
p. 44). This process is connected to the “mythical norm” on how groups or individuals
should perform their identities. If they are performing in accordance with this, they “uphold
the boundaries that separate them from the Other” (Perry, 2001, p. 51) (from the out-group
in the Allportian sense), and ultimately the social relations of power. At the same time, in
the case of the opposite, when they fail to perform their identity in normative ways, they are
held to be doing difference inappropriately. “Members of subordinate groups are potential
victims because of their subordinate status, they already are deemed inferior and therefore
deserving of whatever hostility and persecution come their way” (Perry, 2001, p. 56). Staub
(1996) adds to this that “systematic devaluation and dehumanization of members of another
group < . . . > leading to open, and often mass violence against the group.” Therefore,
contemporary authors agree that violence is the ultimate result of discrimination – it
reaffirms the appropriate order, it emerges to punish those who do a difference inappro-
priately, which is a more nuanced meaning of the Allport scale of the progression of
prejudice.
Hate crimes: operationalized denition and legal framework
The discourse around hate crimes in literature contributed to the developments in legisla-
tion. The idea of the progression from discrimination into violence described earlier, was
adopted by ODIHR. In their “Practical Guide to Hate Crime Laws,” ODIHR mentioned 2
factors that can cause hate crimes to increase: (1) social acceptance of discrimination against
particular groups and (2) marginalized status of the communities who are disproportio-
nately victims of hate crimes. Those 2 factors can also increase the harm caused by hate
crimes when a community has historically been a victim of discrimination – other members
of the targeted group can feel at risk of a future attack (ODIHR, 2009, p. 20). In this
argument, ODIHR aligns with Perry’s (2001) view that mentioned the “symbolic nature” of
hate crimes means those acts are aimed at damaging not the immediate victim only but also
at reaching the community to create fear, hostility, and suspicion.
This community effect is especially highlighted by some authors who include the societal
effects of hate crimes in its definition. For example, Wolfe and Copeland (1994) defined
a hate crime as the “violence directed towards groups of people who generally are not valued
by the majority, who suffer discrimination in other arenas, and who do not have full access
to remedy social, political and economic injustice.” Similarly, in the original research
Kondakov (2019) mentioned “underprivileged sexuality” in the proposed operationalized
definition of hate crime as “a violation of the Criminal Code that reveals the relationship
between perpetrators’ actions and their biases towards the selected victims’ real or perceived
underprivileged sexuality or gender expression” (Kondakov, 2019, p. 945). Perry’s defini-
tion in that sense is more neutral as it did not directly include such an assumption, stating
that hate crime involves “acts of violence and intimidation, usually directed toward stigma-
tized and marginalized groups” (Perry, 2001, p. 11). The concepts developed in literature
influenced ODIHR’s understanding of hate crimes. The organization’s definition is as
follows – “hate crimes are criminal acts committed with a bias motive.” This functional
characteristic allows it to be broken down into two essential elements. First, a “base offense”
(an act that is qualified as a criminal offense in a jurisdiction) – this is similar to Kondakov
(2019), who in his definition mentions a “violation of the Criminal Code.” Second, “bias
motive” (an intentional choice of the target because of some protected characteristics that
8S. KATSUBA
are shared by a group; ODIHR, 2009, p. 16). As one can observe in the four definitions of
hate crime above there is no mention of the word “hate” (Kondakov does use the word
“bias”). A bias motive toward the victim can be manifested in a variety of different acts. Not
in all cases does the perpetrator feel “hate” toward the victim, the crimes can be committed
out of resentment, a desire for peer approval, or vulnerability of the “easy target.” Despite
the absence of the feeling of hatred, these acts can qualify as hate crimes as long as they
contain two elements discussed before (a base offense and a bias motive).
Therefore, there are three advantages of the definition provided by ODIHR that will be
useful for the purposes of this research. First, it encapsulates concepts developed in the
literature (including the progression from discrimination to violence). Second, it has two
well-defined objective elements, which allow the research to employ it and apply it to the
databases of court rulings. Finally, it is very similar to the definition used in the original
research by Kondakov (mentioned above) which helps to achieve homogeneity of results.
The idea of applying the definition of hate crime to identify relevant cases and generate
statistics is further highlighted by the fact that the hate crime legislation in Russia is
inefficient. The legal framework of hate crimes includes penalty enhancements (sometimes
referred to as “aggravating circumstances provisions” – clauses that increase the penalty for
a base offense when it is committed with a bias motive). Penalty enhancements are
incorporated in the Russian Criminal Code and include the list of protected characteristics
and markers of group identity. The list is not exhaustive as it states “motivated by hatred or
enmity towards any social group.” The Constitutional Court (Resolution 24-П dated
23.09.14) confirmed that “a social group can also be understood as groups of persons
with a certain sexual orientation.” This enables courts to apply penalty enhancements in
cases of hate crimes against LGBTQ. However, the perpetrators who targeted LGBTQ
people are seldom prosecuted under the hate crimes legislation. Kondakov (2019) found
that specific penalty enhancements were implemented 5 times in the period of 2011–2016
(Kondakov, 2019, p. 943). The current research expanded this timeframe and added
additional sources but was able to find only 1 more case, making it 6 cases of officially
recognized aggravated crimes for the period of 2010–2020. Moreover, all 6 cases were from
before 2013, which means that the penalty enhancement clauses were not used after the
introduction of the “gay propaganda law,” leaving hate crimes against LGBTQ unseen to the
public. This situation was criticized by the European Commission against Racism and
Intolerance (ECRI), which highlighted the lack of concepts adopted in international law
and the ambiguity of wording which makes it impossible to collect statistics on hate crimes
depending on their motive (ECRI report on the Russian Federation (fifth monitoring cycle),
2018). The suggestions from the ECRI report were never adopted and the existing legal
mechanisms remain inefficient for monitoring hate crimes, a different method of generat-
ing statistics through analyzing court decisions has to be adopted. The current research
bridges this gap by using the concepts of hate crimes available in the literature and
generating data that is not reported by the authorities.
Methodology
This section will first elaborate on the sources of data that were used in the research
(including the databases of judicial documents and the court rulings themselves). It will
then describe the process of data collection and introduce three criteria that were applied in
VICTIMS & OFFENDERS 9
order to identify hate crimes against LGBTQ (base offense, bias motive, and sexuality of the
victim).
Sources: databases of court rulings
The research is focused on one type of data: court rulings of criminal cases related to
violence against LGBTQ. These can be found in public databases. The original research used
two databases to obtain such documents. First, the e-system Pravosudie (ГАС Правосудие)
(https://sudrf.ru/) – an official database of information on judicial documents in Russia,
developed by the Supreme Court. The database includes documents of all courts of the
Russian Federation. Although the database was created in 2006, the most complete doc-
umentation is available after 2010. As of March 2022, Pravosudie includes almost
13.000.000 texts related to criminal cases (Pravosudie, no date).
Another database used in the original research is no longer available – RosPravosudie
was a nonprofit and non-government project, created to provide more transparency and
openness to justice in Russia. The database was however discontinued in 2018 after the
website was blocked by the Russian authorities.
The current research is adding two additional databases, both from private companies.
These two databases are not publicly available and offer access to their data as subscription-
based services. First, Garant (Гарант) system – the first large-scale commercial legal
information system in Russia (since 1990) developed by Garant-Service-Universitet LLC.
This system is intended for legal specialists and contains a variety of documents: federal and
regional legal acts, acts of government bodies, and a database of court decisions. As of
March 2021, Garant contained almost 10.000.000 texts of criminal proceedings (http://
english.garant.ru/, no date).
Second is Consultant Plus (Консультант Плюс) – a similar legal information system
developed by ConsultantPlus LLC in 1992. It provides access to up-to-date databases on
federal, international, and regional legislation as well as a database of court rulings that
contains almost 20.000.000 texts of criminal proceedings (About ConsultantPlus
\Консультант Плюс, no date). Using these two additional databases mitigates two limita-
tions that the original research had: the fact that Pravosudie does not contain criminal cases
from Moscow – the biggest city and the most populous region of Russia, as well as the fact
that RosPravosudie is no longer available. This significantly improves the results and helps
to make the research more comprehensive.
Analyzing court rulings
The three databases used for research purposes (state-owned Pravosudie, private Garant,
and Consultant Plus) allow searching for court judgments using keywords. In the original
research, a set of keywords was developed based on the most common terminology used by
courts in relation to LGBTQ. The current research used the same set of keywords to allow
homogeneity of the data.
2
After the initial screening, irrelevant documents were disre-
garded. Then the search results were analyzed in order to identify cases that satisfy three
criteria: (1) the case is a case of a criminal offense (base offense criteria), (2) the victim is
associated with LGBTQ (sexuality of the victim – either presumed or real – is mentioned in
the text), (3) the motive of the crime and the choice of the victim is related to the
characteristic of LGBTQ as a social group (bias motive criteria). These three criteria helped
to identify the documents that are of interest.
10 S. KATSUBA
The documents are then retrieved from databases and analyzed further. All the docu-
ments are first-instance court decisions in an anonymized form. The anonymized data is
mostly the names and surnames of the participants of the process, their places of work, etc.
Other details are presented in full, including the information on the victim’s sexual
orientation.
All the documents have the same structure. According to the Russian Code of Criminal
Procedure (Chapter 39), a first instance court judgment consists of four parts – introduc-
tory, descriptive, motivational (these two are not strongly divided into sections), and
resolutive. The introductory part of the judgment contains the name of the court that
rendered the verdict, the composition of the court, the information on the participants of
the trial, the defendant, and the provision of the Criminal Code for the crime of which the
defendant is accused. The descriptive part starts with a general report on the criminal
offense (usually as it was presented by the investigation and the prosecutor) indicating the
place, time, method, motives, goals and consequences of the crime. The motivational part of
the judgment starts with analyzing testimonies of the defendant, the victim, and then
witnesses, then proceeds to analyze other evidence. The motivational part also includes
the qualification of the crime, aggravating circumstances, and other legal measures that
need to be applied. Finally, the resolutive part of the judgment contains the final verdict of
the court (Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation, 2001, arts. 304, 307, 308).
Therefore, the information on the base offense is found in the introductory part, while the
information on the sexuality of the victim and motives of the perpetrator – are in either
descriptive (established by the court or the investigation) or motivational (in testimonies or
other evidence).
First criteria: base offense
Similar to the original research, this paper is focused on criminal cases only. This is to satisfy
the requirement of a base offense in the operationalized definition – the act constitutes an
offense under ordinary criminal law. Most of the crimes that were identified fall under two
chapters of the Criminal Code: either Crimes Against Life and Health (Articles 105 –
Murder, 111, 112, 115 – Intentional Infliction of Injury, 119 – Threat of Murder), or
Crimes Against Property (Articles 158 – Theft, 159 – Swindling, 160 – Misappropriation,
161 – Robbery, 162 – Robbery with Violence, 163 – Extortion, 167 – Willful Destruction or
Damage of Property). The research disregarded the criminal cases with no specified victim
(such as crimes against public order).
Second criteria: sexuality of the victim
In court judgments, the sexuality of victims is mentioned either in the descriptive part (in
that case it is established by the investigation and the court) or in the motivational part (in
that case it is mentioned in the testimonies of the accused, witnesses, or among other
evidence). Usually, the courts use the same language in order to describe the sexuality of the
victim (“non-traditional sexual orientation”). In the majority of the cases, the information is
provided by the defendants themselves in their testimony:
[from the testimony of the defendant] C.A. indicated that together with his friends < . . . > they
are members of a social group “Occupy Pedophilia”, whose members are against homosexu-
ality and pedophilia. [the group] decided to earn extra money in the following way: find people
VICTIMS & OFFENDERS 11
who are prone to same-sex relations on social media, lure them into an apartment (thereby
verifying their non-traditional sexual inclinations) and then film them confessing on camera
that they are pedophiles. This record would then be used in order to demand money from that
person.
judgment 1-24/2017 Traktorozavodsky District Court, Chelyabinsk Oblast
As can be seen from this excerpt, the defendant does not conceal the fact that the homo-
sexual target was chosen intentionally. However, apart from the testimonies of defendants,
there is still a significant number of cases where courts themselves established that the
choice of the victim was based on their sexuality. In that case, this information is included in
the general report of the crime (descriptive section):
[circumstances of the case established by the court] A. intentionally caused grievous bodily
harm, dangerous to human life, resulting in the death of the victim B. < . . . > The motive for
committing the crime for A. was a personal dislike, due to the fact that B. is a person with
a non-traditional sexual orientation.
judgment 1-22/2020 Tashtagolsky District Court, Kemerovo Oblast
In this instance, a “personal dislike” due to the sexual orientation of the victim as a motive
for a crime is among the facts established by the court, which is sufficient for the research.
Not in all cases does the actual sexuality of the victim match the way it is perceived by the
offender. There are cases when an offender selects a victim because of a mistaken perception
of the victim as LGBTQ. In that case, the perpetrator perceives information (for example,
a hairstyle, an earring, etc.) that is, potentially falsely, attributed to the sexuality of the victim
and it serves as a trigger of the attack:
[testimony of the victim] This young man behaved aggressively, insulted him, called him
a person of non-traditional orientation because he had a piercing in his ear (gold-plated
earrings). He tried not to pay attention to it, so as not to provoke further conflict. However,
the young man, came closer, hit him with his hand, grabbed his neck, and began to pull out the
earrings causing him pain.
judgment 1-172/2016 Preobrazhensky District Court, Moscow
[testimony of the defendant] He noticed that people were passing by, one of them had bleached
hair. He thought that the person was of non-traditional sexual orientation and decided to beat
him up.
judgment 1-13/2019 Justice of the Peace, judicial district 11, Altai Krai
In these two examples, the appearance of the victims served as a trigger for the attack.
Regardless of the actual sexuality of the victims, these cases do qualify as hate crimes against
LGBTQ since the appearance (earrings in the first case and bleached hair in the second) was
enough for the perpetrator to perceive the victims as LGBTQ and attack them based on that.
Third criteria: bias motive
The bias motive means that the perpetrator intentionally chooses the target of the crime
because of some protected characteristic (ODIHR, 2009, p. 16), in the original research such
protected characteristics include “victims’ real or perceived underprivileged sexuality or
gender expression” (Kondakov, 2019). This element is the most important one because it
12 S. KATSUBA
differentiates hate crimes from other crimes. In this instance, the terminology “hate crime”
might be misleading because the perpetrator does not have to feel direct “hatred” toward the
victim. For the purpose of the research, I use two modules of defining motive described by
ODIHR – hostility and discriminatory selection. The main difference between these two is
the presence of an emotional element in choosing the victim.
Hostility model. In the hostility model, the offender must have committed the offense
because of hostility or hatred based on one of the protected characteristics (ODIHR, 2009,
p. 47). This requires evidence that the offender demonstrated or acted out of enmity toward
the victim – this might be insults or aggressive acts prior to the crime (for example, when
the victim is being insulted after coming out and then it escalates into a crime). This model
is difficult to apply since it requires evidence of a strong emotional connection between the
protected characteristic and the perpetrator’s motivation and this might be subjective. Perry
(2001), ODIHR (2009) as well as ECtHR (in Nachova v Bulgaria) suggested that one way to
establish hostility toward victims can be evidence of manifestations of such hostility
immediately before or right after the crime. When analyzing the cases of hate crimes, the
research identified 4 main types of such hostile manifestations. First, statements of hostility/
hatred toward LGBTQ in general:
[testimony of the witness] At about 5 am M came into his room. He asked what happened, but
M. directed the knife at his side, the knife was covered in blood, and told him to be silent or he
would also be killed. He then said that homosexuals should not live, using obscene language.
M. directed the knife to NAME1ʹs throat while saying that. After that, M. took his belongings
and left the room.
judgment 1-387/2013 Butyrsky District Court, Moscow
In this instance, the offender’s comment “homosexuals should not live” was addressed to
one of the witnesses right after committing a murder, which reveals the motive of the act.
Second, insults and derogatory comments on the victim’s sexuality:
After robbing Z., the young people began insulting Z. a person of non-traditional sexual
orientation, beating him, calling him names, and pouring beer on him. Then one of them
began to burn his hair. Z. was forced to eat soil and confess that he is of non-traditional sexual
orientation. They also tried to shave his head. In addition, he was strangled with suspenders.
The young people filmed everything that happened on the cameras of mobile phones.
judgment 1-594/2016 Promyshlenny District Court, Stavropol Krai
In this example, the victim was targeted using dating apps and attacked by a group of
offenders. The records of the case include insults and derogatory comments about the
victim’s sexuality during the attack, which is considered to be a manifestation of hostility.
The third type of manifestation of hostility is asking questions about the victim’s
sexuality immediately before the crime as an attempt of verification by the perpetrator for
motive-justification:
Z was washing the dishes and V thought he was behaving unnaturally feminine. Seeing this,
V asked him: “You are so effeminate, are you top or bottom?”. Z replied that it was none of his
business. Then V said: “I see now - you are a homosexual”. After that, a fight broke out between
them, V became very angry, he grabbed a knife from the knife rack. He hit Z with this knife,
Z tried to run away from him. He ran out of the kitchen and struck Z a couple more blows with
VICTIMS & OFFENDERS 13
his knife, after which Z fell, and blood flowed profusely. He began to inflict many random
blows on his body. He beat him with a knife randomly, Z tried to snatch the knife and grabbed
the blade, but he pulled his hand back. After that, he hit him with a couple more blows and
Z stopped moving. V went to the kitchen and noticed that the entire floor was stained with
blood. He went to the gas stove to light a cigarette.
judgment 1-3/2011 Supreme Court of the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania
In the above example, the questions regarding the victim’s sexuality preceded the attack.
Similarly, in many cases, asking questions can be a way to initiate the fight and express
hostile attitudes about the LGBTQ.
Finally, the manifestations of hostility can be observed in cases when the perpetrators
intend to “punish” the victims for being homosexual. This might include auxiliary acts,
(beyond the crime itself) that are intended for degrading the victim:
NAME18 pleaded guilty and explained that on <date> he was drinking alcohol with NAME19.
NAME19 told him that he was a person of non-traditional sexual orientation, and offered him
to enter into an intimate homosexual relationship. This made him angry, he beat NAME19,
struck him with multiple blows to his face and body, < . . . >. At the same time, in order to
punish NAME19 for homosexual inclinations, in order to humiliate the latter, he forced the
latter to be naked, and photographed him on the phone, forcing him to demonstrate his
genitals, while expressing threats and insults.
judgment 1-26/2015 Khanty-Mansiysky District Court, Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug
In this instance, the victim was attacked after recognizing his homosexuality. After attacking
the victim, the offender tried to also punish him for his “homosexual inclinations,” which
manifests hostility toward LGBTQ.
In some cases, open manifestations of hostility (insults, etc) are absent. However, the
crime happens immediately after the victim comes out to the perpetrator. In that case,
violence is the response to the new information that the perpetrator learns about the
sexuality of the victim.
[testimony of the defendant] The three of them began to drink vodka. At some point,
B. informed him of his non-traditional sexual orientation. This made him angry and he hit
B. in the face with his fist 2 times. B. fell to the floor near the sofa. He then hit him with his feet.
After that, he decided to leave but before that - to steal something from the things belonging to
the victim in order to sell them, and buy alcohol.
judgment 1-20/2010 Zaraysky City Court, Moscow Oblast
In the above example, it is not entirely clear if the offender committed the crime out of the
hostile feelings that he had toward the victim, at least no manifestations of such hostility
were recorded. However, it is apparent that the crime was committed immediately after the
defendant became aware of the victim’s sexuality.
Discriminatory selection model. In the discriminatory selection model, the offender delib-
erately targets the victim because of a protected characteristic, but no actual hatred or
hostility is necessary to prove the offense. This model includes crimes where
a stereotypically vulnerable target is chosen, normally those who are less likely to report
the crime to the police (for example, when a gay person is robbed on the assumption that
they will be too scared to report the crime).
14 S. KATSUBA
Defendant M pleaded guilty at the hearing and testified that he met K in 2010. < . . . > M had
financial difficulties, which K knew about and the latter suggested to rob people of non-
traditional sexual orientation, finding them on the Internet, to which M agreed. < . . . >
Fulfilling the plan, they met P, who invited them to the apartment, where they spent some
time talking. < . . . > M went into the bedroom and saw that P was lying face down on the bed,
his arms and legs were tied, as it seemed to him, with straps. K said that he used a choke hold on
P, and he lost consciousness for a while, but he would soon come to his senses. After that,
together with K, they left the apartment with the stolen property, took a taxi to Komsomolskaya
Square, where they sold the stolen property for about 20 thousand rubles, which they shared
equally. He did not have an agreement on the murder of the victim with K, these actions of the
latter were unexpected for him and are an excess of the perpetrator.
judgment 2-7/2014 Moscow City Court
In the above example, it can be seen that the group of offenders decided to commit a crime
due to “financial difficulties.” Robbing homosexual victims was seen as a solution to that.
Therefore, the offenders were mainly profit-oriented and no direct hostility was expressed.
Another form of discriminatory selection crime would be a case when the perpetrator
commits a crime for peer approval and gaining status and acceptance (for example, so-
called “gay bashing”). The discriminatory selection is broader since it is applied to the cases
when crimes are committed “because of” or “by reason of” the victim’s protected char-
acteristic. In other words, this causal link does not have to include or specify any emotions
of the perpetrator. The following is one example of that:
On the opposite side of the boulevard, a man was sitting on a bench, A, E, and M approached
this man to keep him company. The man introduced himself as N. and the four of them began
to drink alcohol on a bench. During the conversation, N. said that he is a person of non-
traditional sexual orientation. A. began to laugh at him, and M told A. that he should beat
N. and take away the property that is with him, for which A. said that he did not want to beat
him. M said if A and E do not want to beat N then they are persons of non-traditional sexual
orientation as well. Then A inflicted N, one sharp blow with the fist of his right hand and
immediately a second sharp blow with the fist of his left hand to the face, from which
N immediately fell off the bench, and at that moment E came up. and inflicted two blows on
his face with his fists. Further, M told A. to take the backpack of N.
judgment 1-31/2019 Kuzminsky District Court, Moscow
In this excerpt, after realizing the sexuality of the victim, one of the offenders (M.)
encouraged others to beat the victim. After they refused, M. pressured them by saying
that if they do not do it, they are homosexuals as well. After this, the two other offenders
attacked the victim.
One last notion about the discriminatory selection model is that very often the very
nature of the attack shows that it was motivated by a biased selection of the target. For
example, in cases of dating violence, the victims were found through gay dating apps and
websites.
As I mentioned at the beginning of this section, in a vast majority of cases evidence of the
bias motive appears in either testimony of the defendant or the circumstances of the case.
However, the courts seldom use the word “hatred,” it is usually either “personal enmity” or
“personal dislike.” This wording is common since the legal consequences of this would not
be as serious as if there was a direct indication of a hate motive. The “dislike” formula is
convenient for courts and investigators in terms of procedure, since it fills the gaps in the
VICTIMS & OFFENDERS 15
evidence base, but is not time-consuming and does not require further investigation (it’s
ambiguity means it does not need as strong evidence base to justify as hatred).
[facts established by the court] DD.MM.YYYY at about 10 o’clock, due to the personal enmity
towards NAME1 which came from the fact that the latter is a homosexual, acting intentionally,
in order to cause grievous bodily harm, NAME2 provoked a conflict. During the conflict, he hit
NAME1 on the head, causing NAME1, bodily injuries from which NAME1 died at the scene.
judgment dated 28.04.2011 Stavropol Krai
In the above example, the court used the wording “personal enmity” to describe the
motivation of the perpetrator.
The three criteria described in this section (base offense, the sexuality of the
victim, and the bias motive) proved to be useful in identifying the cases of hate
crimes against LGBTQ among thousands of court rulings. The examination of cases
is used to build a database of crimes, generating criminal statistics and facilitating
qualitative analysis of the main categories of crimes. This is discussed in the follow-
ing section.
Data description and interpretation of the results
Dynamics of hate crimes against LGBT in Russia (2010–2020)
By applying the criteria of hate crimes from legal literature, the research was able to
investigate such documents over the course of 11 years – from 2010 to 2020. The following
main figures were identified: 1056 crimes committed were committed against 853 victims
with 365 cases resulting in fatalities. The data is broken down further, it shows an increasing
trend in the number of hate crimes against LGBTQ (Figure 5). Besides that, the number of
crimes after 2013 (the year when the “gay propaganda law” entered into force) is higher and
remains at a higher level until the end of the decade. In 2014 for example, the number is
three times higher than in 2010.
Figure 3 illustrates the main findings. The number of crimes is the number of times
a criminal offense was recognized by the courts. It is possible that several different crimes
were committed against one individual, which will bring a number of qualifications into the
case with one victim only (a very common example is a murder (Article 105) combined with
theft (Article 158) – in that case, the perpetrator will be accused of committing two crimes).
Conversely, in a single case there might be several victims. Therefore, the number of victims
can be considered as a proxy for the number of cases while the number of crimes represents
the number of convictions. All three numbers (crimes, victims, and fatalities) show a similar
trend and are consistent throughout 11 years which illustrates the credibility of this
categorization.
The increase in the number of hate crimes against LGBTQ cannot be attributed to the
overall level of criminality. In order to illustrate that, the research compared the official
statistics of crimes available (for 2 types of crimes – Murder and Bodily harm, as those are
most likely to be reported) and the number of similar crimes against LGBTQ people
(Figure 4).
16 S. KATSUBA
The overall trend for those crimes in the country is negative and the numbers have been
gradually decreasing over the years, while similar crimes against LGBTQ do not follow the
same trend and show a spike between 2013–2015.
The study has a number of limitations. It includes only the incidents that reached the
courts, it is unable to cover unreported crimes. How many people report such incidents?
Russian LGBT Network in its annual reports on violence and discrimination suggested that
in 2021 the report rate for hate crime incidents was 9.7% (3430 participants), while in 2020
it was between 2–7% depending on a region (>6000 participants; Issledovaniye disckrimi-
natsii v otnoshenii LGBT lyudey, no date). Therefore, numbers generated by this study lie in
this small percentage of reported crimes. One can hypothesize the more accurate number of
incidents of homophobic violence using the trend offered in the present research and the
report rate suggested by the NGO. Additionally, the numbers from LGBT Network show
that the increase in the level of violence cannot be attributed to the increased level of
reporting, since reporting such crimes remains at a very low level.
Nevertheless, the data allows drawing some critical propositions and hypotheses for
further research. First, violence against LGBTQ people in Russia is systematic, since
these are not isolated cases. Second, as the ECtHR rightly hypothesized, there is
a potential influence of the “gay propaganda law” on the number of such crimes,
since it is higher after 2013 and remains at relatively the same level throughout the
decade.
Figure 3. Number of hate crimes against LGBTQ in Russia (2010–2020).
VICTIMS & OFFENDERS 17
Types of crimes: base oense
The research suggests two further categorizations. First of all, the “number of crimes” is
further clarified based on the types of offenses according to the Criminal Code. This will
allow seeing what kind of offenses are committed against LGBTQ using the official
terminology of the legislation. Based on the respective articles of the Criminal Code,
I apply the following categories: Crimes Against Life and Health,
3
Crimes Against
Property,
4
Other Crimes.
5
As can be seen, the categorization of crimes based on the base offense shows a more or
less even distribution between the categories.
There is a hypothesis in legal literature that violent attacks against LGBTQ are
usually more severe. For example, Kondakov (2019) noticed that the penalties for the
offenders are typically higher in cases of violence against LGBTQ due to the fact that
such crimes generally tend to be more violent. Perry (2001) referred to the statistics
that 60% of LGBTQ homicides “show evidence of rage or hate-fueled extraordinary
violence, dismemberment of bodies, genital mutilation, use of multiple weapons,
repeated blows, numerous stab wounds.” The current research tests this hypothesis
by applying the “extraordinary violence” criteria to the cases in the Crimes against life
and health category. This allows seeing the percentage of incidents characterized by
any of the above (dismemberment of bodies, genital mutilation, use of multiple
weapons, repeated blows, numerous stab wounds). The results show that out of 531
incidents in the Crimes against life and health category, 354 have at least one of the
Figure 4. Crimes against LGBTQ in comparison with the overall level of crimes.
18 S. KATSUBA
above-mentioned indications of “extreme violence,” which represents 67% of the cases
in this category.
Types of crimes: bias motive
The “number of victims” is further divided into three categories based on the motivation of
the offenders. The research proposes three additional categories. The first two are based on
if the crime was prepared in advance (including purposefully selecting a homosexual
victim) or was committed without preparation. The last category (“gay panic defense”
cases) is specific for anti-LGBTQ hate crimes.
First category: Premeditated attacks (crimes that are planned in advance with
a purposeful selection of a homosexual victim). It includes hate crimes that were committed
with preparation. This includes attacks on LGBTQ people based on either hostility toward
members of the group or selecting them as a “convenient target.” Many cases in this
category are attributed to the activity of homophobic hate groups, the victims were targeted
through dating apps or websites. Most commonly, this category includes crimes against
property – robbery is the most common crime, but there is still a number of cases with
fatalities.
Second category: Not premeditated attacks. It includes violence committed without
preparation. Those crimes are often based on information about a victim that is somehow
related to sexuality. Some cases in this category include violence after coming out, attacks
on the basis of appearance/hairstyle, other random attacks, etc. The distinguishing feature
Figure 5. Type of crimes: Base offense.
VICTIMS & OFFENDERS 19
of this category is that the crimes were committed without preparation and did not involve
the purposeful targeting of homosexual victims. The fact that there is no element of
preparation makes the crimes in this category less systematic, they are not the product of
the activity of hate groups but they are attributed to individual actors only.
Third category: “Gay panic defense” cases. In these cases, a defendant claims to have
acted in a state of violent, temporary insanity, committing assault or murder, because of
unwanted same-sex sexual advances (Chuang & Addington, 1988). Not all crimes would
qualify as hate crimes in this category. It is essential to use a mechanism of proportionality
to analyze if the actions of the attacker were disproportionate to the claimed “unwanted
same-sex sexual advances.” It helps to distinguish between cases of self-defense and shows
that the perpetrator went too far. The following is an example of clearly disproportionate
actions that would qualify for this category:
[testimony of the accused] When they were on the balcony, G began to touch his legs and his
back, pulled him by the neck to kiss him, and offered to stay with him for the night. When
G tried to kiss him, he turned and pushed him away, after which he ran into the kitchen.
G followed him. At that moment, he took a knife from the table and struck G a blow. He struck
him with a few more blows, G fell to the floor. He went out to the balcony and threw the knife
out the window.
judgment 1-139/2015, the Republic of Mordovia
In this case, the perpetrator attacked the victim after the latter tried to kiss him. The
response of the offender (attacking the victim with a knife) is disproportionate to the
Figure 6. Types of crimes: bias motive.
20 S. KATSUBA
“unwanted sexual advances” of the victim. Therefore, this case qualifies as a hate crime
incident. Results applying 3 categories are represented in Figure 6.
It can be observed that the number of “gay panic defense” cases is relatively stable over
the decade, unlike the other two categories. The category of premeditated attacks is
specifically of interest since there are significantly more crimes in this category after 2013
(10 in 2010, 50 in 2017) but also because this category demonstrates a consistently high level
of crimes. Unlike the category of not-premeditated crimes which shows an emotional spike
and then a gradual decline in numbers, there had been consistently more premeditated
attacks for 6 consecutive years (2014–2019). Moreover, 3 years in a row it was a predominant
category of hate crime against LGBTQ in Russia (2017, 2018, 2019). It means that there is
a specific type of hate crime that was enabled after 2013 and it has a long-lasting effect that
only ceased at the end of the decade. For a period of time, most of the hate crimes against
LGBTQ were the ones that were committed with preparation, including a purposeful
selection of a homosexual target. The cases of premeditated attacks are mostly cases of
collective violence, attributed to the activity of homophobic hate groups. The clear mani-
festation of bias together with the collective nature of these violent incidents distinguish
them from other crimes in the database and make them a more advanced form of violence.
The influence of the “gay propaganda law” on the quantitative change in the number of
hate crimes might be disputable since it can be described as a case of correlation rather than
causation. However, the qualitative change (more cases of extreme violence, and crimes
becoming more specific and more developed) strengthens the link between discriminatory
policy and the rise of violence against the discriminated group and makes the progression of
hate crimes more apparent. The two factors described above (more cases of extreme
violence, and more cases in the category of premeditated crimes) signify a qualitative
change that is being attributed to the influence of discriminatory legislation.
Conclusion
The research represents an inquiry into the dangerous nature of discriminatory legal acts.
The “gay propaganda law” in this instance is a case study of a legal act restricting a salient
group. The research is grounded in the theoretical assumption that discrimination (by way
of imposing restrictive legislation) affects the level of violence against particular groups. The
project builds on developments in the literature that consider hate crime to be a systematic
product of heteronormative policies, particularly elaborating on a hypothetical statement
from the ECtHR about the potential negative outcomes of the “gay propaganda law” that
can lead to prejudice, homophobia, and a rise in violence against LGBTQ. The results of the
research proves the ECtHR hypothesis right by providing statistics on hate crimes against
LGBTQ before and after the introduction of the “gay propaganda law.”
The research employed the method of analyzing official judicial documents from
Kondakov (2019) and significantly enriches the existing knowledge while at the same
time mitigating the limitations that the previous research had. The current project was
able to identify more than 1000 hate crime incidents between 2010 and 2020. The data
shows that the number of such crimes is significantly higher after the introduction of the
“gay propaganda law” in 2013. The number of planned crimes with a purposeful targeting of
the homosexual victim per year is 5 times higher in 2015 than in 2010 and remains on the
VICTIMS & OFFENDERS 21
same level until the end of the decade, which can be attributed to the activity of the hate
groups that organized such crimes.
Additionally, compared to the original research, the current project is able to generate
a number of cases sufficient for descriptive analysis. This enabled the research to answer
questions regarding types of hate crimes against LGBTQ. The paper categorizes the crimes
based on the base offense (Crimes against life and health, Crimes against property) and on
the bias motive (based on if the crimes were committed with preparation (Premeditated
attacks) or without preparation (Not premeditated attacks), as well as “gay panic defense”
cases).
The current research was able to articulate a qualitative change in the hate crimes against
LGBTQ, showing the effects of discriminatory legislation not only through the number of
violent incidents but also through their character. The research found that 67% of the
crimes have indications of “extreme violence,” which proves the assumption made in the
original research that crimes against LGBTQ are more severe. Moreover, the cases of
premeditated attacks with the purposeful selection of a homosexual victim were prevalent
after 2013. Overall, the descriptive analysis represents hate crimes against LGBTQ in Russia
not as a series of isolated events but as a continuation of the systematic marginalization of
this group. The violence that was partially produced by this legal act is an inevitable
consequence of the introduction of such restrictions by lawmakers.
Notes
1. Russian LGBT Network, Transgender Europe (TGEU), ILGA-Europe, Civic Assistance
Committee, Coming Out LGBT Group, LGBT Initiative Group Stimul and SOVA Center
2. нетрадиционный (non-traditional), гомосексуализм (homosexuality), мужеложство (sod-
omy), лесбиянство (lesbianism), транссексуал (transsexual), меньшинство (minority).
3. Criminal Code Chapter 16, the following articles: 105 (Murder), 111, 112, 115 (Intentional
Infliction of Injury), 119 (Threat of Murder)
4. Criminal Code Chapter 21, the following articles: 158 (Theft), 159 (Swindling), 160
(Misappropriation), 161 (Robbery), 162 (Robbery with Violence), 163 (Extortion), 167
(Willful Destruction or Damage of Property)
5. 4 articles of the Criminal Code that appeared in data but do not belong to the previous two
categories: 126 (Abduction), 139 (Illegal Intrusion into a Property), 244 (Damage upon Bodies
of the Deceased and Their Burial Places), 325 (Theft or Damage of Documents)
Acknowledgments
This research is a part of the PhD project, which will not be possible without the invaluable help of the
supervisors of the project - Dr Sara Benedi Lahuerta and Dr Alexander Kondakov. I would like to
thank them for their guidance and support throughout the project. I would also like to express
gratitude to Dr Silvia Gagliardi and Dr Marie Luce Paris for their comments and helpful recommen-
dations and Dr Matthew Cobain for his generous suggestions that helped to significantly improve the
paper. Finally, I would like to thank three anonymous reviewers for their insightful comments.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
22 S. KATSUBA
ORCID
Sergey Katsuba http://orcid.org/0000-0001-8979-4211
References
http://english.garant.ru/. (no date). Retrieved March 14, 2022, from http://english.garant.ru/
About ConsultantPlus\Консультант Плюс. (no date). Retrieved March 14, 2022, from http://www.
consultant.ru/sys/english/
Allport, G. W. (1954). The nature of prejudice. Addison-Wesley Publishing Company. http://catdir.
loc.gov/catdir/enhancements/fy0831/79112200-b.html
The attitude of Russians to the LGBT community. (no date). Retrieved March 10, 2022, from https://
www.levada.ru/en/2021/10/19/the-attitude-of-russians-to-the-lgbt-community/
Bayev and others v. Russia. (2017). Retrieved November 12, 2021, from https://hudoc.echr.coe.int/
eng#{%22fulltext%22:[%22bayev%22],%22documentcollectionid2%22:[%22GRANDCHAMBER
%22,%22CHAMBER%22],%22itemid%22:[%22001-174422%22]}
Chuang, H. T., & Addington, D. (1988). Homosexual panic: A review of its concept. The Canadian
Journal of Psychiatry, 33(7), 613–617. https://doi.org/10.1177/070674378803300707
Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation. (2001).
Danniye Sudebnoi Statistiki. (no date). Retrieved March 10, 2022, from http://www.cdep.ru/index.
php?id=79
Democracy Index 2021: The China challenge. (n.d.). Economist Intelligence Unit. Retrieved April
20,2022, from https://www.eiu.com/n/campaigns/democracy-index-2021/
ECRI report on the Russian Federation (fifth monitoring cycle). (2018). Retrieved March 10, 2022,
from https://rm.coe.int/fifth-report-on-the-russian-federation/1680934a91
Eremin, A., & Petrovich-Belkin, O. K. (2022). State policies regarding sexual minorities in Russia:
From Russian Empire to modern day Russian Federation. Sexuality & Culture, 26(1), 289–311.
https://doi.org/10.1007/s12119-021-09891-0
Fenwick, P. H. (2019). Finding “East”/“West” divisions in council of Europe States on treatment of
sexual minorities: The response of the Strasbourg court and the role of consensus analysis. (3), 28.
https://dro.dur.ac.uk/28703/1/28703.pdf
Glick, P. (2005). Choice of scapegoats. In J. Dovidio, L. A. Rudman & P. Glick (Eds.), On the nature of
prejudice: Fifty years after Allport (pp. 244–261). Blackwell Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1002/
9780470773963.ch15
Healey, D. (2017). Russian Homophobia from Stalin to Sochi (HPOD ed.). Bloomsbury Academic.
Herek, G. M. (2007). Confronting sexual stigma and prejudice: Theory and practice. Journal of Social
Issues, 63(4), 905–925. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-4560.2007.00544.x
Herek, G. M. (2009). Sexual Stigma and sexual prejudice in the United States: A conceptual frame-
work. In D. A. Hope (Ed.), Contemporary perspectives on Lesbian, Gay, and bisexual identities
(pp. 65–111). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-09556-1_4
Issledovaniye disckriminatsii v otnoshenii LGBT lyudey. (no date). ЛГБТ-сеть. Retrieved April 19,
2022, from https://lgbtnet.org/library/reports/issledovanie_po_diskriminatsii_v_otnoshenii_lgbt_
lyudey_v_rossii_kolichestvennye_dannye/
Johnson, P. (2011). Homosexuality, freedom of assembly and the Margin of appreciation doctrine of
the European Court of human rights: Alekseyev v Russia. Human Rights Law Review, 11(3),
578–593. https://doi.org/10.1093/hrlr/ngr020
Johnson, P. (2015). “homosexual propaganda” laws in the Russian Federation: Are they in violation of
the European convention on human rights? Russian Law Journal, 3(2), 37–61. https://doi.org/10.
17589/2309-8678-2015-3-2-37-61
Kondakov, A. (2019). The influence of the “gay-propaganda” law on violence against LGBTIQ people
in Russia: Evidence from criminal court rulings. European Journal of Criminology,
147737081988751. https://doi.org/10.1177/1477370819887511
VICTIMS & OFFENDERS 23
Luhn, A. (2015, July 29). LGBT website founder fined under Russia’s gay propaganda laws. The
Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jul/29/lgbt-yelena-klimova-fined-russia-
gay-propaganda-laws
Mason, G. (2001). The spectacle of violence: Homophobia, gender and knowledge. Taylor & Francis
Group. Retrieved August 16, 2022, from http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/ucd/detail.action?
docID=180245
My freedom defends yours’: Propaganda and truth about homophobia in Russia. (2014). Amnesty
International Ireland. https://www.amnesty.ie/freedom-defends-propaganda-truth-homophobia-
russia/
Novaya Gazeta.(2017). (1491051780000) Novaya Gazeta. Retrieved April 20, 2022, from https://
novayagazeta.ru/articles/2017/04/01/71983-ubiystvo-chesti
ODIHR, O. (2009). Hate crime laws: A practical guide, OSCE. Retrieved March 10, 2022, from https://
tandis.odihr.pl/handle/20.500.12389/20495
Организатора Фестиваля «Дух Огня» Оштрафовали За Пропаганду ЛГБТ’. (n.d.). Znak.Com.
Retrieved November 13, 2020, from https://www.znak.com/2020-10-27/organizatora_festivalya_
duh_ognya_oshtrafovali_za_propagandu_lgbt
Perry, B. (2001). In the name of hate: Understanding hate crimes. Psychology Press.
The persecution of a feminist Russian artist. (n.d.). The Economist. Retrieved January 11, from
https://www.economist.com/books-and-arts/2020/10/14/the-persecution-of-a-feminist-russian-
artist
Pravosudie. (no date). Retrieved March 15, 2022, from https://bsr.sudrf.ru/bigs/portal.html
Prinyaty zakonoproekty o zashite traditsionnykh tsennostey. (2022). Государственная Дума.
Retrieved November 20, 2022, from http://duma.gov.ru/news/55609/
Russian Federation | HCRW. (no date). Retrieved May 31, 2022, from https://hatecrime.osce.org/
russian-federation
Russian LGBT Network. (2019). Retrieved April 20, 2022, from https://web.archive.org/web/
20190630191112/https://lgbtnet.org/en/newseng/new-wave-persecution-against-lgbt-people-
chechnya-around-40-people-detained-least-two-killed
Sleptcov, N. (2018). ‘Political Homophobia as a State Strategy in Russia’, Journal of Global Initiatives:
Policy, Pedagogy, Perspective, 12(1). https://digitalcommons.kennesaw.edu/jgi/vol12/iss1/9
SOVA Center for Information and Analysis. (no date). SOVA Center for Information and Analysis.
Retrieved November 26, 2021, from http://www.sova-center.ru/en/database
Staub, E. (1996). Breaking the cycle of violence: Helping Victims of genocidal violence heal. Journal of
Personal and Interpersonal Loss, 1(2), 191–197. https://doi.org/10.1080/15325029608412840
Wilkinson, C. (2014). Putting “Traditional Values” into Practice: The Rise and Contestation of Anti-
Homopropaganda Laws in Russia. Journal of Human Rights, 13(3), 363–379. https://doi.org/10.
1080/14754835.2014.919218
Wolfe, L., & Copeland, L. (1994). Violence against women as bias-motivated hate crime: Defining the
issues in the USA. In M. Davies (Ed.), Women and violence (p. 204). Zed Books.
Zorkin predlozhil izmenit osnovopologayushiye documenty OON. (2014). Retrieved November 29,
2021, from https://www.fontanka.ru/2014/09/29/230/
24 S. KATSUBA
