Upstate county settles with NYCLU over mistreatment of transgender people in jails

As Republicans statewide and nationally take aim at transgender rights to attack Democrats during a crucial election year, advocates for transgender rights have won new training policies for a small upstate town and county to ensure that transgender and gender nonconforming individuals are treated equitably by law enforcement officials. 

Former President Donald Trump has repeated a claim in recent weeks about Democrats wanting to perform “transgender operations on illegal aliens that are in prison.” But in reality, trans rights advocates are fighting for even basic protections for transgender and gender nonconforming individuals who are impacted by the criminal justice system. For years, advocates and attorneys with the New York Civil Liberties Union have attempted to get training policies implemented for law enforcement and corrections officers to ensure that trans individuals are treated with respect if they have an encounter with police or become incarcerated. 

State lawmakers are trying to approve a law that would enact uniform training policies statewide, but the legislation has not yet passed. In the meantime, NYCLU has taken the fight to the local level, demanding that individual counties and municipalities implement new training policies. They achieved their latest victory in Watertown, the seat of Jefferson County in the North Country. DeAnna LeTray, a former Watertown resident, sued both the Watertown Police Department and Jefferson County in 2021 over alleged harassment and assault at the hands of law enforcement and corrections officers. Both the police department and county agreed to a series of new policies regarding the treatment and correctional placement of transgender and gender nonconforming residents. 

LeTray told City & State that she had never had significant interaction with the criminal justice system prior to the 2017 incident, in which law enforcement responded to a call regarding a domestic dispute involving her daughter’s boyfriend. She said that responding officers misgendered her and called her names. LeTray was arrested and spent a short amount of time at the Jefferson County Jail, where she said she was forced to remove her wig and subject to a strip search during which she said she was sexually assaulted. “That night, when that happened, it completely changed my life,” LeTray said. “When I was in the jail cell after the assault, I wanted to die. That’s how horrible it was.”

LeTray said that she is incredibly proud of the settlement and the new policies that are being put in place as a result. “I was lucky enough to survive this,” she said. “But other trans people might not be as lucky.” The settlement covers a range of requirements for officials to adhere to, including that searches be conducted in a way consistent with a person’s gender identity, that jail and law enforcement officials use a person’s chosen name and pronouns and that a person is housed according to their gender identity. As part of the settlement, officials in Jefferson County and Watertown must also ensure that incarcerated individuals in their care have access to necessary medical and mental health care, including care for gender dysphoria and clothing consistent with a person’s gender identity. Representatives for the Watertown Police Department and Jefferson County did not respond to a request for comment about the settlement.

LeTray’s case in Jefferson County is the third such settlement that NYCLU has achieved, following similar cases in rural Steuben and Broome Counties. “It's our position that every county and every police department should have a policy like this,” NYCLU senior staff attorney JP Perry said. “They really should be standard practice in this day and age in New York.” Perry said that some other counties have willingly adopted the model policies without the need for litigation. Last year, NYCLU sent a letter to every sheriff’s department in the state requesting that they implement policies for the treatment of transgender and gender nonconforming people in their care. So far, 15 departments have adopted the policies. “I think that jails and police departments, especially in a state like New York, are becoming increasingly aware that we're paying attention to the way that they treat trans people and LGBT people in custody,” Perry said.

But even as piecemeal reforms are implemented, the state is still missing uniform guidance. That’s why groups like NYCLU are also pushing for the passage of the Gender Identity Respect, Dignity and Safety Act, better known as GIRDS. State lawmakers have passed a number of new protections for LGBTQ+ New Yorkers ever since Democrats gained control of the state Senate in 2019, but the GIRDS Act remains one of the major outstanding priorities. The legislation, which is sponsored by state Sen. Julia Salazar, would require correctional facilities across the state to implement policies similar to those that Jefferson County just agreed to adopt, including housing individuals according to their gender identity and ensuring that incarcerated people have access to commissary items and clothing that align with their gender identity.

Salazar told City & State that legislative leaders and Gov. Kathy Hochul held discussions about passing a weakened version of the bill during the most recent legislative session. But Salazar said that the compromise version of the bill would have excluded the “presumptive placement” provision for housing transgender and gender nonconforming individuals, instead relying on the current informal process of convening a panel to consider individual requests. Salazar said such a compromise would be unacceptable to her and her Assembly counterpart, especially if the rationale for weakening the bill was that cisgender women might feel unsafe around transgender women and gender nonconforming individuals.

“There are all kinds of reasons, many of which are valid, why someone would feel unsafe in a correctional facility,” Salazar said. “But feelings about safety and the need to protect everyone – incarcerated people and staff – in a facility does not justify discrimination.” Available statistics suggest that transgender people are more likely to be the victims of violence than the perpetrators. That’s particularly true among incarcerated populations. Salazar said that combating the idea that the GIRDS Act would inherently compromise the safety of cisgender women in correctional facilities has been one of the biggest hurdles she has faced as she continues to try to build support for the bill, which she said is a top priority.

The GIRDS Act would not mandate “transgender operations” on people in prison, which Trump has suggested Democrats support. “We cannot get people basic medical care in (the state Department of Corrections and Community Supervision),” Salazar said when asked about the prospect of a law mandating access to gender-affirming care in prisons. But with a resurgence of anti-trans rhetoric both from the Trump campaign and more specifically in New York, Salazar has a message for people who support abortion rights measures like the Equal Rights Amendment but oppose bills like the GIRDS Act that would help trans and gender conforming people. “These fights are inextricably linked,” she said.