Racial Hoax

A racial hoax is a false accusation of criminal victimization that is contingent on the race of a fictitious perpetrator. Typically, these lies are used to direct attention away from the individual making the accusation, who is often the actual criminal offender. Race is a central factor in these stories, because the stories are generally created by individuals attempting to increase the credibility of their allegations by capitalizing on the fears, stereotypes, and assumptions about those of another race. Although racial hoaxes may be created by individuals of any race against individuals of any other race, it is most often the case that Blacks are the victims of racial hoaxes perpetrated by White accusers. The racialization of crime in America has increased the likelihood that racial hoaxes will continue to proliferate, unquestioned by criminal justice authorities, and serve as further justification for the questionable practices of racial profiling and DNA sweeps. The racial typification of crime and the criminal typification of race have enabled many racial hoaxes to go unchallenged precisely because the accusations make sense in light of public fears and stereotypes. Though some racial hoaxes are revealed to be fraudulent within a relatively short time, many nevertheless tend to be so compelling because much of the public has come to associate crime with Blacks and Blacks with crime. Phenomena like the actual and perceived involvement of Blacks in crime, the well-known War on Drugs that has disproportionately targeted Blacks, particularly harsh punishments for minority offenders, and the criminal images of Blacks portrayed in various media have all reinforced this linkage. Therefore, the phenomenon of Black [Page 693]typification of crime must exist at some level in order for the racial hoax to be at all compelling.

The scope of fabricated victimizations has been wide and has ranged from accusations about routine ordinance violations to rape and murder. Some of the more notable examples of racial hoaxes during the past several years have misled law enforcement investigations and public searches for imaginary Black offenders and have elicited a significant amount of media coverage. Criminological research conducted by Katheryn Russell indicates that there were 67 incidents of racial hoaxes between the years 1987 and 1996, although not all received equal media coverage. The incident that probably received the greatest amount of attention is the 1994 South Carolina case in which Susan Smith killed her two children. To misdirect the investigation, Smith reported to emergency operators, as well as both state and federal law enforcement authorities, that she had been the victim of a carj acker who was a young, Black male while her sons were in the car. This outraged the community and elicited widespread concern and offers of assistance. It was not until a couple of weeks after the event that Smith admitted to having murdered her own children by drowning them in her vehicle. No third party of any race had been involved.

Other memorable hoaxes that involved White accusers and fictional Black criminals include the case of Robert Harris, who hired a hit man to shoot and kill his fiancée but claimed that the perpetrator was an armed Black man in camouflage; Jesse Anderson, who reported to the police that two Black men stabbed him and his wife, resulting in her death, only to have investigators discover later that Anderson had killed her and then tried to make it seem as though he, too, had been attacked; and a female student at George Washington University, who claimed to have been raped on a college campus by two young Black men but later admitted that she had made up the story to heighten rape awareness among the student body. In all of these instances of individuals using a racial hoax, there is no apparent reason to have identified the suspect as Black except to exploit society's fears and anxieties about a racialized criminal type in hopes of strengthening their own story.

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