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Report The Case Before Exposing It To The Public, Malta’s Hate Crime Unit Urges

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File a formal report of hate speech or hate crime before exposing the incident in public, Malta’s Hate Crime And Speech Unit urged. 

“It will help us a great deal if people who notice hate speech on social media report to us on our different mediums prior to exposing the issue in public,” they said.

It warned that exposing perpetrators of online hate crimes may incentivise them to delete the evidence as soon as they are aware that a formal report is going to be made to the unit.

It could also push them to edit the information which would not constitute evidence in the court of law, so it is essential that the link itself of the incident and a screenshot is not in edited form.

“Naturally, in a criminal court, it is the best evidence that has to be presented.”

This comes after a surge in hate speech comments directed at young anti-racism activists who fought for the 425 migrants to be let into Malta after being kept on commercial vessels for over a month.

The unit said that recent cases are “clear examples” of hate speech, or inciting violence based on personal views and attributes as described in Article 82A in Chapter 9 Malta’s Criminal Code.

In order to file a report against online hate speech with a formal criminal complaint, it must include a screenshot of the post or comment; the URL link of the alleged offender’s profile and a screenshot of their profile and the URL link of where the post and comment were originally published.

The unit, which consists of a team of 12, was established over a year ago to encourage hate crime victims to seek legal and psychological support. According to Shift News, 34 reports have been made since its inception in October 2019. 

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Sam is a journalist, artist and writer based in Malta. Send her pictures of hands or need-to-know stories on politics or art on [email protected].

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