Not All Hate Crimes Laws Are Used to Battle Anti-Gay Violence

Sometimes they’re used to turn the fleecing of the elderly from a grand larceny charge that carries no minimum jail time (for amounts under $1 million) into one that gives the convicted at least one, and up to 25 years in prison. Prosecutors in New York are experimenting with the state’s hate crimes law, which includes “age” as a protected class, against folks like Shirley Miller, who got four senior men to give up a collective $500k. [NYT]