The U.S. Department of Justice is suing Utah over how it treated an incarcerated transgender woman, whose mental health crisis worsened to the point of self-harm as she endured delays and inadequacies in medical care.
In a letter sent to state officials less than a month ago, the Justice Department detailed instances in which a Utah prison repeatedly refused to allow the woman to purchase female clothing and cosmetics, how corrections officials treated gender dysphoria differently from other medical conditions and how those actions caused her gender dysphoria to worsen to the point “she performed dangerous self-surgery and removed her own testicles” nearly two years after entering custody.
The correspondence also warned that the federal government would take legal action unless the state, among other things, agreed to stop what it characterized as discriminatory practices against incarcerated people with gender dysphoria. Filed Tuesday, the lawsuit names the state, the Utah Department of Corrections and the Utah Department of Health and Human Services.
Corrections, which works with DHHS to provide health care to people in its prisons, did not immediately provide comment on the lawsuit. In response to the March letter, Executive Director Brian Redd said the state was “blindsided” by the report, and that “we fundamentally disagree with the DOJ on key issues, and are disappointed with their approach.”
Gender dysphoria is a condition that is covered under the Americans with Disabilities Act. While being transgender is not considered a disability, some trans people experience the medical condition, which causes severe mental and emotional distress when a person’s assigned sex at birth and their gender identity don’t align. Managing the condition includes both medical care and living consistently with one’s gender identity.
Justice Department attorneys are asking that the court take several actions in response to the alleged discrimination, including that it enjoin the state and “its agencies, agents, employees, instrumentalities, successors, contractors, and all persons in active concert or participation with it” from discriminating against the inmate and others with gender dysphoria.
A ruling in the case could impact how Utah enforces two laws passed during the most recent legislative session that guide the state’s care to transgender people in its custody.
Measures in “Sex-based Designations for Privacy, Anti-bullying, and Women’s Opportunities,” more widely known as HB257, extend to correctional facilities. That law changed the legal definitions of “female” and “male” to categorize Utahns by the reproductive organs of their birth, and keep people who don’t meet those definitions — primarily transgender people — from using sex-designated spaces in government-owned or controlled buildings.
Another law, “Inmate Assignment Amendments,” has a more narrow focus on incarcerated transgender Utahns. It generally prohibits the Department of Corrections from assigning trans people to housing areas that align with their gender identity.
While transgender people can request to be assigned to a different living area, they are required to undergo an “individualized security analysis” to assess a number of factors — including their physical characteristics, whether they are sincere in expressing their identity, their social behavior and “any other factor determined to be relevant.”
