SPONSOR: Dolan
COMMITTEE ACTION: Voted "Do Pass" by the Standing Committee on Judiciary by a vote of 9 to 0.
This bill creates the offense of masked intimidation, which a person commits if the person, while hiding or concealing his or her face with a mask or hood or other article or device, intentionally harasses, intimidates, or threatens another person with the intent to place the other person in reasonable fear for his or her physical safety. The offense of masked intimidation is a class C misdemeanor for a first offense and a class B misdemeanor for a second or subsequent offense. The bill provides exceptions to the offense.
A person who commits the offense of masked intimidation and the State believes the offense to be knowingly motivated because of a victim's race, color, religion, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, or disability, the person will be guilty of a hate crime and a class E felony.
This bill is similar to SB 1150 (2026).
PROPONENTS: Supporters say that this creates a misdemeanor for committing masked intimidation, which is intentionally concealing a person's identity with the intent to put a person in reasonable fear of his or her safety. They first tried to pass this legislation because of intimidation issues starting in the 1940s when the KKK would wear hoods to intimidate people. The Anti- Defamation League (ADL) has also worked on this issue with the intent to "unmask hate" and other states have enacted similar legislation. Twenty states have done this and this needs to be done in Missouri because we have seen a resurgence of this activity in the State.
Testifying in person for the bill were Representative Dolan; Jordan Kadosh, ADL; and Arnie C. Dienoff .
OPPONENTS: There was no opposition voiced to the committee.
Written testimony has been submitted for this bill. The full written testimony and witnesses testifying online can be found under Testimony on the bill page on the House website.
Statutes affected: