Criminal acts of hate crimes are forms of violent behavior motivated by prejudice, and may be aimed at a number of legally protected characteristics of the victim, the group to which he or she belongs, or to the property. Hate crimes represent a form of violent bigotry, intolerance and hurt and encroach on the personal identity of the victim, so they are often called "crimes with a message". The impact that hate crimes have on the victim, but also on the community to which he or she belongs, requires the application of effective mechanisms for their suppression and prevention. What specifies hate crimes and differentiates them from other criminal acts is precisely motivation by prejudice, but the element of motivation is harder to detect in practice, so the records of hate crimes are often not always credible. In this paper, starting from the very concept of hate crimes, the essential features and characteristics of this criminal act will be clearly emphasized. Then, I will touch on the basic divisions of the typology of commiters in order to understand the complexity and ways of committing crimes through individual examples in practice and available statistical data. Also, the paper will analyze the problem of not reporting hate crimes by the victims and the guidelines of the EU Agency for Fundamental Rights regarding the improvement of the system of fighting and preventing this crime. Through practical examples, some similarities, but also differences, between terrorism and hate crimes will be pointed out. In order to emphasize the importance of adequately sanctioning such punishable behavior, individual cases from the practice of the European Court of Human Rights, as well as Croatian courts, will be analyzed. The notion of offenses committed out of hatred as milder forms of punishable behavior and the importance of their sanctioning will also be explained.