BLACKS NOT IMMUNE TO RACIAL HATE.

Byline: EARL OFARI HUTCHINSON

THE nine black teen girls and one boy who are charged with a racially motivated hate crime against whites in Long Beach have made a sort of perverse history: It's one of the rare times that underage blacks have landed in a court docket for hateful attacks against whites.

The case raises the always-thorny issues of racial divisions, racial violence and what is or isn't a racial hate crime. And it tosses a glaring spotlight on the recent surge of hate-crime attacks in L.A. County.

The facts in the Long Beach trial are much disputed. Prosecutors say that on Halloween night, the teens viciously harassed, beat and kicked three white women. The teens allegedly hurled racial taunts and insults, including screams of ``I hate whites,'' at the women before and during the assault.

Defense attorneys say that the teens did not assault the women and that they were singled out solely because they are black and were convenient, accessible targets.

It's the hate-crime charge against black teens that is the most intriguing and tormenting. Traditionally, blacks have been the targets of racially motivated hate crimes, and that hasn't changed in the past decade. According to the FBI's annual report on hate attacks in America, there are about 10,000 such attacks yearly, and in more than half of them, blacks are the targets.

In the San Fernando Valley, it's even worse. There have been 12 murder attempts on mostly young blacks by Latino gang members in the past five months. The blacks have no known gang ties.

But the Latino-on-black assaults and the alleged black-on-white hate crime in Long Beach seem peculiar to L.A. In the majority of the hate attacks nationally, assailants are white -- usually adult white males, and even more typically a motley assortment of the racist crackpot fringe.

The black teens in Long Beach don't fit the standard profile of racial hate purveyors. But does that mean that they don't qualify?

The jury is literally still out on that question. But the answer is a resounding ``yes'' that blacks can and do commit hate crimes. And as it turns out they are committing lots more of them than generally known.

According to the 2004 FBI hate-crimes report, blacks committed slightly more than 20 percent of the hate crimes in America. In most cases, their victims were whites.

And there's where the confusion comes in: Did the blacks assault whites solely for their money and valuables, or out of anger for a real or imagined racial insult?

These questions blur the line between common street crime and hate crimes, and they make it easier to ignore or downplay the racial aspect of the attacks. Authorities, also mindful of potential backlash from black leaders, dread inflaming racial tensions and so are deeply reluctant to brand black-on-white attacks as hate crimes.

That's plainly evident in the Long Beach case. City officials and local black leaders are cautious and guarded in what they say about the case. They have bent way over to look for reasons beyond race to explain the assaults. They have cited frustration, boredom and anger as possible extenuating motives.

But the Long Beach attacks have heightened racial distrust and tensions in the city. Some blacks have said they fear whites will blame them for the attacks, and some whites have said they fear that blacks will target them. When blacks say or do nothing about these attacks, it is taken by some as a tacit signal that blacks put less value on white lives than on black lives.

That's ironic. For decades, blacks have shouted, often with much justification, that black lives have been shamelessly devalued when they are the victims of hate crimes. And that's even more reason that there should be no double standard in condemning hate attacks, no matter the color of the assailant.

But local civil-rights leaders have not rushed to the barricades to say and do much about the case. They are understandably conflicted by it. They know the vicious history of hate attacks against blacks, and they are loath to rush to judgment and convict the teens.

One thing is certain: This case puts the issues of hate on trial in a Long Beach courtroom.