"Transgender Tragedies"

A new analysis finds Washington, D.C. topping the list in transgender murders

by Yusef Najafi
Published on 12/28/2006
In the past decade in Washington seven people were murdered, or died, as a result of someone else's wrongdoing because they were transgender. And those are just the ones that were reported.

A new analysis from the Gender Public Advocacy Coalition (GenderPAC) titled 50 Under 30: Masculinity and the War on America's Youth, reminds us who they were.

It also profiles the deaths of 43 other transgender people from around the nation, between the ages of 13 and 30, and ranks the District of Colombia as the city with the highest number of reported incidents.

Those who were killed in Washington include Imani Williams, 24, an African-American transgender woman who was found beaten and shot to death on Aug. 21, 2003. Her murder remains unsolved.

Those who were killed in Washington include Imani Williams, 24, an African-American transgender woman who was found beaten and shot to death on Aug. 21, 2003. Her murder remains unsolved...

Transgender Woman Wins Suit

Lambda Legal and Sylvia Rivera Law Project Settle Lawsuit on Behalf of Transgender Youth Denied Appropriate Care in State Custody

As part of the settlement, SRLP and Lambda Legal will work with the Office of Children and Family Services (OCFS) over five years to evaluate OCFS’s treatment of transgender youth in its custody.

(New York, December 20, 2006)  —  Lambda Legal, Sylvia Rivera Law Project and Deveboise & Plimpton LLP today announce the settlement of a lawsuit on behalf of a transgender youth who was denied appropriate medical treatment and punished for her gender expression in New York juvenile facilities.

Alyssa Rodriguez, now 20 years old, is a transgender woman who was deprived of her prescription hormone medication and punished for her feminine hairstyle and other aspects of her gender expression by the Office of Children and Family Services (OCFS) while at the Red Hook Residential Center and other New York facilities in 2002–2003. Rodriguez had been on hormone therapy from a young age and experienced both severe health consequences and emotional distress due to withdrawal symptoms after being forced to go without hormone treatment.

"Alyssa is thrilled that OCFS is committed to ensuring that no other transgender youth in its care will have to endure the suffering she did,” said Rudy Estrada, Staff Attorney in Lambda Legal’s Youth in Out-of-Home Care Project...