Black, Trans(gressive) Lives: Furtive Blackness & The Surround of Extralegal Violence

Forthcoming in the Georgetown Journal of Gender and the Law, Spring 2025

Forthcoming in the Georgetown Journal of Gender and the Law, Spring 2025

(Also featured at their spring symposium in the 2025 Biennial Symposium on Gender and Sexuality Law: Transcendence: Legal Efforts to Protect and Advance LGBTQIA+ Youth Rights’ “Best Constitutional Arguments for Trans Rights” panel)

Black, Trans(gressive) Lives: Furtive Blackness & The Surround of Extralegal Violence

Introduction: A Note On Method & Framing

“If slavery persists as an issue in the political life of black America, it is not because of an antiquarian obsession with bygone days or the burden of a too-long memory, but because black lives are still imperiled and devalued by a racial calculus and a political arithmetic that were entrenched centuries ago. This is the afterlife of slavery--skewed life chances, limited access to health and education, premature death, incarceration, and impoverishment.”^[1]

― Saidiya V. Hartman, Lose Your Mother: A Journey Along the Atlantic Slave Route

“After the Egyptian and Indian, the Greek and Roman, the Teuton and Mongolian, the Negro is a sort of seventh son, born with a veil, and gifted with second-sight in this American world, – a world which yields him no true self-consciousness, but only lets him see himself through the revelation of the other world. It is a peculiar sensation, this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one’s self through the eyes of others, of measuring one’s soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity. One ever feels his two-ness, – an American, a Negro; two souls, two thoughts, two unreconciled strivings; two warring ideals in one dark body, whose dogged strength alone keeps it from being torn asunder. (1997 [1903]: 38) [This passage henceforth referred to as the “Strivings” text.]”^[2]

-WEB DuBois

"History isn't something you look back at and say it was inevitable, it happens because people make decisions that are sometimes very impulsive and of the moment, but those moments are cumulative realities."

“We are fighting for our lives.”

-Marsha P. Johnson, BlaQueer NonBinary Activist & Leader of Stonewall Riots

The wider society is still replete with overwhelmingly white neighborhoods, restaurants, schools, universities, workplaces, churches and other associations, courthouses, and cemeteries, a situation that reinforces a normative sensibility in settings in which black people are typically absent, not expected, or marginalized when present. In turn, blacks often refer to such settings colloquially as “the white space.”

—Elijah Anderson^[3]

When writing articles for law journals, I often find myself in a bit of a panic. No, not panic in the sense that I am overwhelmed with erratic thoughts nor a “sudden or overpowering fright” in the sense of the noun; though that is not a totally dissimilar experience.^[4] Instead, my experience is more aptly described by the classic understandings of the adjective form “of, relating to, or resembling the mental or emotional state believed induced by the god Pan” and/or “of or relating to the god Pan.”^[5] Pan, the Greek deity, was said to possess the stentorian voice resembling that of the heralds of Olympus.^[6] As the lore goes, when the ancient Greek gods were in battle against a legion of giants; it was the loud and overwhelming shout of Pan that instilled fear in the giants and enabled the victory of the old gods.^[7] While I do not consider myself a deity—and it may seem exceptionally queer to cite Greek mythology in a paper portending to center BlaQueer Trans folks—this is neither an exaltation of mythology nor the rote academic performance of narcissistic grandeur.

The shout of Pan, and the attending feeling or state of mind that it allegedly resulted in, is not dissimilar from the plight of the BlaQueer person in law, legal academia or society. This witnessing of fright, tantamount to the double consciousness referenced above by DuBois—and the recognition of such—is instead less illustrative of internal dilemma, disorder or a diagnosis arising from the DSM and wantonly applied to Black and BlaQueer and Trans people, but instead yet another piece of embodied evidence of both the ways in which the body keeps score and in internal accounting of the ordering and disordering of Black and BlaQueer life and death.^[8] The voice of the god Pan was an announcement of his presence both received and reinterpreted as a cause for fear, a signal of unraveling of the preferred order of the recipient and, above all an existential threat that required extraordinary fight or flight.

The panic I experience in writing this piece, or any law review article or essay, is both rote and unique. It is rote insofaras it has become a familiar, if unwelcome, feature of scholarship about Black and BlaQueer living and dying. It is unique, because it is a burden only affixed to those both fluent in the methods of sociolegal death dealing and the ontological violence of the semiotics of law, legal reasoning and its attendant academic norms. Writing in these mediums about issues concerning the ways in which Black and BlaQueer people live and die, or lived and are killed, requires the writer to sit with the weight of unending death and the illusory, but precedential, promise of justice. Put differently, the ways in which law orders and disorders the way Black and BlaQueer people live and die–and the impossibility of creating a cognizable grammar of redress or route to justice–is reflective of both the current social order and the afterlives of slavery.^[9] This panic, for me, operates as both a sociopolitical navigational tool for mapping power and an analytic for understanding how precedents and other sociolegal logics of antiBlackness and queerphobia operate together to render Black and BlaQueer people furtive and thereby in and outside of law.^[10] We, and by extension our arguments, are seen as inherently furtive and strictly scrutinized as if our livelihoods cannot possibly be understood as a compelling interest, entitled to intellectual, social or legal redress. We are rendered inside of law, insofaras we are always, already reachable by its disciplinary arm but consistently outside of the reach of the protective powers of jurisprudence.^[11] The panic here then, is not illogical, but instead the embodiment and experience of a lived and inherited logic—not dissimilar from what DuBois called “double consciousness--that allows and requires me to not only consider what I’m writing and arguing, but to also anticipate how my arguments, if not my very presence and daring in the academy, will be taken up through precedential logics of antiBlackness and queerphobia in White space.^[12] Scholars such have L. Bennet Caper^[13] and Renee Nicole Allen^[14] have done a great deal of work to expand and explicate the notion of White space, the status of a social life and calculus that is determined by the norms, desires, fears and logics of white folks as determinative and dispositive. In other words, panic here is the experience of confronting and working through the question of “And what of the BLACK (and BlaQueer) in Black letter law?”^[15] while also contending with the reality that Black and BlaQueer people are strictly scrutinized, via a legal and social inversion of the 14^th amendment and jurisprudential constraints on government intrusion on protected classes and fundamental rights^[16], all while being on the run for/of our lives.^[17] It is from this state of panic, knowing and anticipation that this essay arises.

In beginning my research for this topic, I was astounded to see how little work had been done on the issues surrounding Black Trans Youth and the law. What little I found concerned two things: 1) methods and manners of Black Trans Death and 2) the onslaught of laws that facilitate and give symbolic incentives and permission for legal, social, policy, economic and physical violence. These stories, these lives, the lives of Black trans youth, however, do not begin at the tomb, despite it being the unrivaled and primary space of consideration for Black trans life. Black trans life must be understood, like all of Black life, as more than mere matter or cannon fodder for the next culture or battle for the retention and accumulation of power and this consideration and regard should not require the perfect trans person. In articulating the formulation of the fundamental right to marry, Justice Kennedy reminds of the sacrosanct right to human dignity. This right, regard and call to human decency should not and must not require perfection. To require perfection, excellence or contrived performances of our desired understandings of humanity, in order to situate BlaQueer and Trans people as deserving of life, is to further situate them outside of the category of the human, the citizen and those deserving of regard. As Zakiyya Iman Jackson—Associate Professor of Literature at Duke University—has often said: “Black excellence is the wrong answer to a racist question.” The right question is, “how has our sociolegal construction of the public and private spheres impacted the way BlaQueer and Trans people live and die?” This essay is a first attempt at, and an invitation, to answer it.

All too often, when speaking of Black trans people—if they are spoken of at all—the conversations begin with debates, discussions and pleadings concerning what trans people “deserve.” This is true for those of us who practice care work, as well as those dripping with studied malice. This is, of course, if the presumption and prescription of the category of personhood is present at all; evidencing a universal skepticism of Black trans humanity. In sum, beginning with or having a discussion, on the basis of deservability belies and gives evidence to the reality of a shared logic that has created a built social, legal, political, libidinal, erotic and economic reality that marks BlaQueer and trans life as excess, debt and simultaneously too little of a good thing and far, far too much of a bad thing that is commonly understood as a contagious, infectious condition or state of being. In her groundbreaking work, “In The Wake: On Blackness and Being” Christina Sharpe pushes those considering Black living and dying to theorize and act from “the modalities of Black lives lived, in, as, under, despite Black death” into the ways that “Black life and Black suffering.”^[18] The quote below enables us to imagine another way of encountering BlaQueer and trans life as well, as they too, exist in the wake; and it provides an apt articulation of the intent and genealogy of this essay.

I want In the Wake to declare that we are Black peoples in the wake with no state or nation to protect us, with no citizenship bound to be respected, and to position us in the modalities of Black life lived in, as, under, despite Black death: to think and be and act from there. It is my particular hope that the praxis of the wake and wake work, the theory and performance of the wake and wake work, as modes of attending to Black life and Black suffering, are imagined and performed here with enough specificity to attend to the direness of the multiple and overlapping presents that we face; it is also my hope that the praxis of the wake and wake work might have enough capaciousness to travel and do work that I have not here been able to imagine or anticipate.^[19] (Christina Sharpe, In The Wake: On Blackness and Being)

In this essay, I posit the practice of descriptive analysis and critical, theoretical engagement as a type of “wake work” and “carework.”^[20] As Christina Sharpe puts it, in “In The Wake: On Blackness and Being,” “that to be in the wake is to occupy and to be occupied by the continuous and changing present of slavery’s as yet unresolved unfolding.”^[21] This articulation of the wake is specifically concerned with “ongoing state-sanctioned legal and extralegal murders of Black people” and foundational to the articulation is the notion Black death is foundational to the American project, especially citizenship and that antiBlackness is embedded in the apparatus of American democracy^[22] In their review of this groundbreaking text, L.G. Fournier posits “thinking” itself as a type of care and underscores the “autotheoretical” genre and methodology as one that is particularly generative for ways of understanding the way antiBlackness shapes our world, especially for non-Black peoples who lack our lived experiences.^[23] Indeed, noting the interventions of Black scholars and artists using autotheoretical methods she writes “from Claudia Rankine’s description of “the condition of Black life” as “one of mourning” in a 2015 New York Times article, to Achille Mbembe’s “necropolitics,” which begins where Michel Foucault’s “biopolitics” falls short” she highlights the ways Black scholars and artists have long explicated the ways that suffering has been uniquely fastened to Black life, with the spectre of death always in plain view.^[24] The mention of Mbembe, in relationship to Foucault, is particularly illustrative of the importance of situating scholarship about Black people, within the realities of Black lived experiences, rather than mere traditional, rote frameworks. The specificity of the Black experience with domination demands more; Mbembe’s intervention with necropolitics necessarily moves beyond Foucault, to mark not only how states wield sociopolitical power to control life; but more immediately for Black folks, how this power is used to order death. Importantly, she notes “Death, grief, and mourning are always a part of life, but they take on different valence in relation to Blackness, which the contributions of thinkers like Mbembe and, now, Sharpe, show. Wake work keeps that death-in-life ever in view.”^[25] This essay is a continuation of that tradition and an invitation to legal scholars and practitioners to think differently about the role that law—particularly the presumptions and social precedents that undergird it—plays in sustaining and extinguishing BlaQueer, and specifically trans, life. This is an invitation, if not a demand, to produce work that keeps “death-in-life” ever in view.

“The policing power, central to U.S. statecraft, that animates and powers racial formation and dislocation in the United States is a legal power that is also extralegal, sociocultural and intramural. To be simultaneously Black and Queer--BlaQueer--and alive, is to be necessarily furtive. It is to move, indeed, to live, without leave. Without permission. It is to be seen and (mis)understood as being in flight from one's duty to perform the labors and languages of compulsory heterosexuality--in Black--or what Christina Sharpe calls “racialsexualgender.”⁹⁴ In other words, we evade the compulsory performances of normative racialsexualgender in ways that are marked as both fugitive and furtive. We flee the things that are not true of our desires, that do not emanate from our own pleasures, erotics and predilections; and we evade the gaze that might uncover these resistances and respond with its terror, because we know that to assert our desires is to be marked as furtive, as justifiably disappeared, lashed or otherwise violated. To be BlaQueer then, is to be furtive in plain sight. Furtivity is a BlaQueer theory--a BlaQueer gaze, analytic and embodied politic--that provides an important intervention to, and a connective tissue among, the fields of law, Black Studies, Black Queer Theory and Black Feminist Theory.”^[26]

This essay does not follow the traditional format of legal scholarship; because the topic and the people it concerns—Black and BlaQueer people and our experiences writ large—are not traditional concerns of legal academia. This is not a defiant essay; but merely one that defies the White norm of manners, or “the method of performance, or embodiment of servitude, that bends Black appearance . . . and personhood to the will and desires of the white gaze” in order to give accurate accounting, albeit non-exhaustive, of Black trans life.^[27] It is also not experimental, as the method and manner of scholarship here are well established in academic genres that explore and center Black life. It is, though, quite queer, quite Black and invites the reader to explore the legal and extralegal implications of beginning with the experiences, conditions and state dis/ordering of Black life, suffering and death as critical sites of inquiry–rather than mere tragedy or accidents of history–for the edification and proper accounting of American law and its lives beyond the courtroom.

We Speak Their Names: A Litany for Survivance (A Red Record of The Strict Scrutiny of Black Trans Life)^[28]

Litany; a noun. Definition 1) : a prayer consisting of a series of invocations and supplications by the leader with alternate responses by the congregation (the Litany of the Saints). Definition 2) a : a resonant or repetitive chant (a litany of cheering phrases—Herman Wouk); b : a usually lengthy recitation or enumeration (a familiar litany of complaints) c : a sizable series or set (a litany of problems; The drug has a litany of possible side effects.).^[29]

Survivance; a term first used by Native American Studies scholar Gerald Vizenor in his book Manifest Manners: Narratives on PostIndian Survivance.^[30] In his own words, "Survivance is an active sense of presence, the continuance of native stories, not a mere reaction, or a survivable name. Native survivance stories are renunciations of dominance, tragedy and victimry.”^[31]

For those of us who live at the shoreline

standing upon the constant edges of decision

crucial and alone

for those of us who cannot indulge

the passing dreams of choice

who love in doorways coming and going

in the hours between dawns

looking inward and outward

at once before and after

seeking a now that can breed

futures

like bread in our children’s mouths

so their dreams will not reflect

the death of ours;

For those of us

who were imprinted with fear

like a faint line in the center of our foreheads

learning to be afraid with our mother’s milk

for by this weapon

this illusion of some safety to be found

the heavy-footed hoped to silence us

For all of us

this instant and this triumph

We were never meant to survive.

And when the sun rises we are afraid

it might not remain

when the sun sets we are afraid

it might not rise in the morning

when our stomachs are full we are afraid

of indigestion

when our stomachs are empty we are afraid

we may never eat again

when we are loved we are afraid

love will vanish

when we are alone we are afraid

love will never return

and when we speak we are afraid

our words will not be heard

nor welcomed

but when we are silent

we are still afraid

So it is better to speak

remembering

we were never meant to survive.

-Audre Lorde, A Litany For Survival^[32]

Islan Nettles, 21, Black Transwoman, 2013

“Although violence toward trans women is far too common and many of us often have varying weapons we carry on our persons to protect ourselves, many of us still do our best to live productive lives and not stay shut in our apartments…Rather than make us go into hiding,” she added, “we are more determined than ever to stand up and be visible.”

--Kiara St. James, 39, a transgender woman who lives in Brooklyn and works for an organization called TransJustice.^[33]

Islan was assigned male at birth and born Vaughn Nettles, the only boy of seven.^[34] Friends and family described them as a tender child, who took great care in their appearance.^[35] She had an early knack for fashion, filling her high school notebook up with designs she meant to bring to life.^[36] In 2008, then only 16, she met Mr. Daequan Andino who became a friend and mentor, at an after school fashion program. Under his guidance, in 2010 Islan participated in her first fashion show, presenting 20 original handstitched items. Her life had not been easy since graduating high school. After coming out as transgender, she had a falling out with her mother—who she would later reconcile—and became homeless, sleeping on the couches of friends.^[37] Islan had finally begun to put the worst behind her; she earned an associate degree from the New York City College of Technology, began imagining herself at the Fashion Institute of Technology and was preparing to present 10 pieces at New York Fashion Week.^[38] According to the New York Times, “she had begun to live publicly as transgender. Seemingly overnight, friends and relatives said, she had metamorphosed from a shy and insecure youth into a radiantly confident young woman.”^[39]

“Fashion became a definite decision for my life after my first show with my hand designed garments in high school at the 11th grade,” she wrote on her LinkedIn page.^[40]

On August 17, 2013 a twenty-one year old Islan and a friend were walking down the historic Frederick Douglass Boulevard, just around the corner from her childhood home, a site that represented both her growth from a shy, young boy to an effervescent, fully realized Black transwoman.^[41] It was then that they ran into a group of six young men including an intoxicated James Dixon.^[42] Dixon, a twenty three year old young Black man, began flirting with Nettles who he thought^[43] “was female.”^[44] When one of Mr. Dixon’s friends shouted “That’s a guy,” Dixon shoved—assaulted—Islan and she pushed him back.^[45] Dixon says he lost his balance and “got enraged” leading him to punch her in the face.^[46] Islan then fell to the curve, hitting her head and sustaining a serious brain injury.^[47] According to prosecutors, Mr. Dixon threw a second punch “as she lay on the ground,” while “driving the side of her head into the pavement.”^[48] Dixon then ran off and fled the seen, stating he “forgot” about the incident until he became aware that Islan was “about to die” and one of his friends was being charged for it.^[49] Dixon was later able to avoid a hate crime charge because prosecutors could not prove he attacked Nettles “in whole or substantial part” due to her transgender identity, the New York state statute requirement.^[50]

According to a Vice report, Dixon was charged with first and second-degree manslaughter, as well as first-degree assault. He pled guilty to manslaughter in the first degree after Justice Daniel P. Conviser ruled that Dixon’s videotaped hour-and-ten-minute 2013 police interrogation was admissible in court.^[51] In the video, he justified his acts by offering a version of the trans panic defense, claiming that he’d felt duped and humiliated by the revelation of his victim’s gender identity.^[52] Dixon told police: "I don't go around gay-bashing people…I don't care about what they do, I just don't wanna be fooled. My pride is at stake."^[53] He later described Islan as a "light skinned she-male in blue jeans" writing that he’d been "fooled by a transgender" which caused him to go into a "blind fury" with Nettles.^[54] Despite this, on April 19, 2016, Justice Conviser sentenced Dixon to 12 years in prison, overriding the Manhattan DA’s Office’s recommendation of 17 years.^[55]

Mr. Dixon’s attraction to Islan Nettles led to their interaction, his public embarrassment about his attraction to her led him to beat her death. By his own admission, Islan Nettles was murdered because he was drawn to her and became enraged at the realization that he had approached, flirted with and engaged a Black transwoman for sexual reasons in public. His defensive assertion that he was “fooled” and that his “pride” was at stake imply that Nettles, by her mere existence on a public sidewalk, had taken something from him and openly belittled him. It is as if the fact of his initial desire for her, operated as evidence of a crime against him–perhaps a theft of desire, or sexual trespass–that entitled him to use deadly force. Mr. Dixon approached and flirted with her. She did not initiate contact and there is no evidence that ever touched him. Her life was taken, on a boulevard named for Frederick Douglass, due to the mere fact that a man found her attractive and either could not contain his rage, or escape the social violence of being trans-attracted, without reigning his rage down on her.

Marco McMillian, 34, Black Gay Man, 2023

Marco McMillian was called the "the first openly gay man to be a viable candidate for public office in Mississippi.”^[56] He graduated magna cum laude from Jackson State and held a master's degree from St. Mary's University in Minnesota in philanthropy and development.^[57] He was deeply intertwined with his respective communities and served as the International Executive Director of the historically Black Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity Inc.^[58] His website and Facebook page show him in photos with a young Barack Obama, former President Bill Clinton and legendary civil rights leader U.S. Rep. John Lewis.^[59] Mr. McMillian, the mayoral candidate, had recently met Lawrence Reed, 22, a few weeks earlier at a local bar where they became friends.^[60]

There are conflicting reports on what happened to Mr. McMillian, mostly arising from disputes between the Coahoma County coroner Scotty Meredith and Mr. McMillian’s family. From the Washington Blade:

“The Times reports Meredith as saying McMillian’s body was found unclothed, with a black eye and two small burns on his skin. Those injuries were not the cause of his death and the cause was still not confirmed pending the completion of the toxicology tests, he told the Times.“There was no beating, although there may have been an altercation,” the Times quoted him as saying. “He got two little bitty burns.” In a statement released on Tuesday prior to the publication of the New York Times story on the Times website, McMillian’s family members said the gay mayoral candidate was “brutally murdered.” He suffered severe injuries from being “beaten, dragged and burned (set afire),” the statement says. “This was reported in our meeting with the local coroner on two occasions,” the statement says.””^[61]

A video was discovered showing Reed and MacMillian together in Marks at a convenience store.^[62] Reed claims McMillian drove them to a dark road and made sexual advances; telling detectives he “felt uncomfortable after he saw McMillian playing pornography on his cellphone and asking Reed about his sexual preference.”^[63] In an initial interview an interview with state Trooper Milton Williams Jr, Reed admitted to killing Mr. McMillian and said he did so because “the guy tried to rape me.”^[64]

After being arrested after an accident, where Mr. Reed was driving Mr. McMillian’s stolen SUV, he would later confess again to Coahoma County Sheriff’s Deputy Joseph Wide that “he choked the mayoral candidate with his wallet chain. After that, Reed loaded McMillian’s body into McMillian’s black Chevy Tahoe and began to drive.”^[65] “As he was trying to figure out where to put the body … he thought he heard something like Mr. McMillian was waking up or coming back to life,” Wide said.^[66] Wide said Reed recounted that he then stopped by some standing water and “got out of the vehicle and pulled McMillian out and put his head in the water to make sure he was dead. … At that time he put him back in the vehicle and he headed back toward Clarksdale.”^[67] After his self defense claim, Lawrence Reed was found guilty of the murder of Marco McMillian and sentenced to life in prison without parole.^[68]

Tasiyah ‘Siyah’ Woodland, 18, Black Transwoman, 2023

“Woodland dreamed of having her own place, her own car—she just wanted to be very independent. She was always very independent.”^[69]

Jayda Amora, Siyah’s Best Friend

“She had hopes, ambitions, dreams. She celebrated her accomplishments and triumphs. All things she deserved, things ripped away from her by gun violence and the transphobia and misogynoir that permeates our society.”

Sue Kerr, Pittsburg Lesbian Correspondents Reporter^[70]

Siyah Woodland and Jayda Amora were fast friends and immediately became inseparable. They met in fourth grade at Lexington Park Elementary in Maryland.^[71] By seventh grade they began transitioning together, first Jayda and then Siyah only 6 months later.^[72] Together, at 17, they worked at Wendy’s and then a local gas station, with Siyah hoping to become a travelling nurse’s assistant.^[73] Most recently, Siyah was working at Hollister while studying at the College of Southern Maryland.^[74]

Early Friday morning, on March 23, 2023 at 1:15am, police responded to a report of shots fired.^[75] Siyah was found dead—having suffered several gunshot wounds—alone in the parking lot of the Big Dogs in Paradise bar in Mechanicsville, MD.^[76] At the time, police stated that there was no indication of a hate-crime; but believe “some type of confrontation” occurred.^[77] Her family, however, disagrees.^[78] She was at least the 8^th trans, non-binary or gender non confirming person to be killed that year.^[79] Two suspects have been charged in relation to her murder. Erin Nicolle Battle age 29 of Waldorf, has been charged with Murder 1st Degree, Firearm Use/Felony/Violent Crime, and Accessory After Fact Murder 1st and 2nd Degree.^[80] The second person, 29-year-old Darryl Parks has been charged with First-Degree Murder, Second-Degree Murder, Firearm Use/Felony-Violent Crime, two counts of Reckless Endangerment from Car, and Illegal Possession of a Regulated Firearm. No convictions have yet been achieved.

Ariyanna Mitchell, 17, Black Trans Girl, 2022

“Ariyanna had her whole life ahead of hershe died heroically protecting a friend, taking a bullet so her friend could escape. Her killer had the audacity to question her gender before shooting her, showing the horrific connection between transphobia and misogyny. We must all work to create a society free from the scourge of gun violence."^[81]

Tori Cooper, the Human Rights Campaign's director of community engagement for its Transgender Justice Initiative

Ariyanna Mitchell a.k.a. Kamari was 17 years old. She led a dance team in the city of Hampton. She was known by her family and friends as the dance machine. Ariyanna Mitchell's death has taken the city of Hampton by storm. She was so young,talented,smart ,beautiful and was very passionate about dancing. Her death bring back sad memories for the transgender community in Virginia we have lost a significant amount of transgender people in the the state of Virginia some are unknown because the authorities fail to identify the transgender community correctly because of this trans related violence goes under the radar. The transgender community in the Virginia area face many barriers from lack of support from family and friends,homelessness, drug addiction and survival sex-work which all these barriers leads to violence against the transgender community. Empowering Transgender Services Inc. is making a stand and coming frontline to say Ariyanna Mitchell name out loud in a peace rally”

-Nyonna Byers, HRC ACTIVATE alumni, Empowering Transgender Services Inc.^[82]

Ariyanna was a seventeen-year-old high school student, in her junior year at East End Academy and a celebrated talent at the Triple E (Electric Eagles Elite), where she led a dance troupe.^[83] A friend of Ariyanna’s, also a transgender girl, says a fight broke out between herself—not Ariyanna—and the girlfriend of the shooter, nineteen-year-old Jimmy Leshawn Williams.^[84] The girlfriend had gone to get Jimmy to shoot Ariyanna’s friend.^[85] Jimmy later arrived at the party to become involved in what he told police was “a planned fight.”^[86] According to Court documents, Jimmy asked Ariyanna who was fighting and she allegedly claimed to have been involved. He then asked her if she was “a boy or a girl.” When Ariyanna misgendered herself as a boy, likely for their own protection, he immediately shot her several times with an assault rifle. Ariyanna was pronounced dead at the scene shortly after 2:00 a.m. on April 2 at a residence on the 500 block of Wine Street in Hampton while Jimmy was arrested on one count of Murder and Use of Firearm in Commission of a Felony.^[87]

Ariyanna was murdered while attempting to intervene and stop a fight and the likely shooting of her friend, another trans girl.^[88] Her self-misgendering did not protect her and likely positioned her more closely to violence. According to the HRC she was “at least the 11^th violent murder of a transgender or gender non-conforming person in the U.S. in 2022.”^[89] The HRC statement says that, at the time, the group was aware of at least 57 transgender or gender non-conforming deaths in 2021 due to violence, which was the largest number of fatal trans violence incidents recorded in a single year since it began tracking anti-trans violence in 2013.^[90] Unfortunately, 2021 would go down in history as the deadliest recorded year for anti-trans violence, with 50 recorded murders. Of those killed 84% were people of color, 85% were transwomen or girls and 66% were Black trans women or girls with more than ¾ of all murdered being under 35 and 1/10 being under 21.^[91]

Amiri Jean Reid and KeJuan Richardson, 21, Transwoman & Nonbinary BlaQueer Man, 2023

Kejuan Richardson was a twenty-one year old, nonbinary gay Black man. Amiri Jean Reid was a twenty-one year old Black transwoman.^[92] They were shot and killed together while driving through their hometown of Toledo, Ohio and pronounced dead on November 14^th, 2023.^[93] An arrest warrant was issued for a suspect, Jorenzo Phillips (19), but he was later found dead via a gunshot wound, on Thanksgiving, that appeared self-inflicted.^[94] Amiri was known for her sense of humor and riveting wordplay, while Kejuan was an avid Avengers fan who loved basketball and supporting local businesses.^[95] At least fourteen trans youth have died violently since 2022.^[96]

Kenji Spurgeon, 23, Black Trans Person (gender pronouns unclear), 2024

On July 1st, 2024 we lost a young Black trans sibling and we heard not an outcry. Not a vibrant buzz from our community in Capitol Hill, not an outpour of outrage for a call to rally. Our local news sources retracted their resources and the publishing of the senseless death of Kenji Spurgeon was made invisible on the pages. Or the information provided was so limited it made her virtually invisible. Kenji’s Black Trans life mattered and we mourn the absences and the invisibility of what we can not know. We mourn the silence of her story that has taken 18 days to reach our community. We mourn the ways gun violence took a 23 year old’s life, full of promise, and we bear the weight of knowing these tragedies are not Washington state specific.

The Lavender Rights Project, At a Vigil^[97]

On July 1, 2024 dispatchers received a report of a shooting around 12:30 a.m. Officers found Kenji lying on the ground with a gunshot wound.^[98] She was pronounced deceased at the scene and details remain scarce with no further information available.^[99] She was only twenty-three years old. According to Pittsburg Lesbian Correspondents: “Kenji is the 27th trans person to die from violence in 2024. They are the 18th BIPOC and 11th Black trans person on our list.”^[100] She was a 2pac fan, enjoyed doing hair and makeup, was an avid Falcons fan and an unstoppable dancer.^[101]

Tai Lathan, 24, Black Transwoman, 2024

“She was very loving. She loved everybody. She was very funny,” Lathan’s friend Koryne Davis told NBC affiliate WBAL. Carla Stokes, Lathan's aunt, told CBS affiliate WJZ that her niece “was just who she was, a very outgoing person, a sweetheart.”^[102]

“This is what you hear me talking about when you talk about that culture of violence," Scott told WJZ. “We have to think about that in its completeness, for everybody in the city of Baltimore — including members of the transgender community.”

-Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott^[103]

Tai'Vion Lathan, was a lively twenty four year old Black transgender woman.^[104] Her body was found at 10am in an alley in West Baltimore.^[105] She had been shot five times and covered in a blanket and left in the alley.^[106] “[T]hat shows the inhumanity that the person who killed her has,” said Desire Bandz, drop-in center coordinator for the trans outreach nonprofit Maryland Safe Haven.^[107] At the time, she was 1 of 13 Black transwomen who had died via violence in 2024.^[108]

“I can’t take no more. I’m tired of losing my people. I’m tired of having to be scared to be myself,” Koryne Davis told WBAL. “I’m tired of having to walk on eggshells because I am who I am. She didn’t deserve that. She didn’t deserve to not be here.^[109]

Skyler Gilmore, 25, Black Transwoman, 2021

Police were called to the residence of Skyler Gilmore on June 4^th, 2021 by a female friend of hers.^[110] The friend was on the phone with Skyler immediately before the shooting, when Skyler received a call to let someone in the apartment’s security gate.^[111] Skyler then called her friend to let her know she’d been shot.^[112] The friend rushed to Gilmore’s apartment to try to help and dialed 911.^[113] She was found in the bathroom unresponsive, with a single gunshot wound to the torso, she would later be pronounced dead at the hospital.^[114]

“Gilmore’s friend told investigators that Gilmore identified as a transgender woman and was involved in survival sex, a form of prostitution where someone engages in sex in exchange for basic necessities like food or shelter,” the DA’s office said.^[115] The office also said that her murder by JaQuan Brooks and Davonte Fore, was ordered by their gang to kill her after they realized she had a relationship with a different one of their members.^[116] Both men were convicted of Malice Murder, two counts of Felony Murder, Aggravated Assault, Possession of a Firearm by a Convicted Felon, and Possession of a Firearm during the Commission of a Felony at trial; however, Fore was released on bond pending trial^[117] and remains on the run.^[118],^[119]

Za’Niyah Williams, 21, Black Transwoman 2021

Za’Niyah was a 21 year old Black transwoman living in Houston by way of Pasadena, California.^[120] On December 20^th, 2021, she was killed in a hit and run and originally identified as Jane Doe.^[121] Her identity only became known due to original reporting and a public call for information by the blog TransGriot, which allowed her mother to identify her.^[122] Police responded to a 911 call from the second driver that had hit her body, who waited for authorities, at the time of the accident she had already been lying in the road.^[123] Police believe she was killed by injuries from the first, unknown driver. No further information is available regarding the circumstances of her death.^[124] At the time, she was the third transperson to die from violence in 2022, all of whom were Black women.^[125]

Her final Facebook post, a reshare, occurred the day before her murder:

“This my last year letting ppl treat me like I dont matter. This my last year thinking that I’m not good enough. This my last year overplaying my part in people’s lives. This my last year watering one sided relationships/friendships. This my last year letting ppl deal with me at their own convenience. This my last year being depressed. This my last year knowing this version of myself. God please just cleanse my mind, body & spirit, shower my thoughts with peace and prosperity, & deliver me from Anyone/anything sent to destroy me.”^[126]

Cam Thompson, 18, Black Nonbinary Person, 2024

“She was a very sweet person, very nice person, never met a stranger,’’ her aunt, Tara Matthews, told AL.com.^[127]

Cam Cameron Jamal Miikquise Thompson lived with her mother and younger brother in Tuscaloosa, Alabama.^[128] She had left home at around 1am on Monday, December 16^th, with only her cell phone.^[129] Her mother, who had been working nightshift, realized around noon that Cam’s purse and other items she’d usually have on her person were still in her bedroom.^[130] After calling her cell numerous times and only getting voicemail, the family called the police around 4pm and were told a body had been found.^[131] Her body was discovered around 1pm, having been shot several times that morning.^[132] She is at least the 31st^st trans, nonbinary, or gender-nonconforming person to have died by violence in the U.S. in 2024.^[133] Other accounts mark her as the 40^th transperson killed this year.^[134] She was a recent graduate of Job Corps and worked at UPS.^[135] An unnamed minor has been arrested and is being tried as an adult.^[136]

Brandon "Tayy Dior" Thomas, 17, Black Trans Girl, 2024

“By all accounts, Tayy was a beautiful soul deeply loved by her family, friends, and community. She had so much life ahead of her, and it is heartbreaking that that potential was ripped away so violently by someone she was supposed to be able to trust. In 2015, we found that over half of all transgender and nonbinary adults were victims of intimate partner violence. So far, in 2024, nearly half of all victims of fatal violence with a known killer were killed by a romantic or sexual partner, friend, or family member. Trans people should be able to trust that the people in their lives will help protect them from this violence, not cause it."

Tori Cooper, Human Rights Campaign Director of Community Engagement for the Transgender Justice Initiative^[137]

“Tayy always had a huge smile on her face showing her dimples,” and that she loved doing her hair and “would help anyone…“That’s the thing that I get the most from her personality. She was a giving person,” Carl said. “That trusting and loving nature got her killed.”^[138]

-Tayy’s grandmother to the Human Rights Campaign and ABC News^[139]

Tayy Dior was a Black transgender girl. She was only 17 years old when her then boyfriend, Carl Mitchell Washington Jr, allegedly shot 18 bullets into her car, causing both her death and crash into a nearby home.^[140] Police responded to a report of shots fired at 3:30am on May 7^th, finding the crashed car and Tayy deceased in the front yard.^[141] They had been in a secret relationship for just over a year.^[142] Her family believes she was killed due to Mitchell’s fear of having their relationship exposed.^[143] When her family saw her at the funeral home, she still had dried tear marks on her face.^[144] Alabama does not have hate crimes enhancements for gender identity or sexual orientation.^[145] According to the Human Rights Campaign, “20% of transgender and gender-expansive people with known killers were killed by a romantic, sexual or intimate partner.”^[146] Also according to HRC: “Thomas’s death is at least the 14th violent killing of a transgender or gender-expansive person in 2024 that HRC has identified — and the second victim under the age of 18, with her death occurring a little under a month after that of River Nevaeh Goddard, a 17-year-old non-binary teen killed in Massachusetts, also by their romantic partner.”^[147]

Carl Joseph Walker-Hoover & Jaheem Herrera, 11, Children, 2009

"There was no reason for the mother to believe he was gay…It just happens he was someone his peers targeted, calling him, 'girlie,' 'gay' and 'fag.' According to the mother, it was a daily occurrence."^[148]

--Daryl Presgraves, Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network spokesman

"I am brokenhearted…We worry about the economy and about Iraq, but we need to be worried about our schools."^[149]

- Sirdeaner L. Walker, Mother of Carl Joseph Walker-Hoover

“On April 16th 2009 my son Jaheem Luis Herrera committed suicide, and i never once got a I'm sorry from the Bullie's Parent's. Ever since I've been seeking Justice and all i got is in-justice. Every Lawyer i turned too and extending my hand's for help turn a blind eye. It hurt's me real bad to know that i'm trying and trying all my best to get that Justice for my baby boy that i will never again see and enjoy. I sometime's feel like giving up, but i feel him pushing me to continue fighting and telling his story.In order for Justice to prevail, i plea for the help of the community, family and friend's to please sign this Petition,because my next goal as a Mother is to push for a Federal Antibullying Law to be pass, so then School Board Member's, Administrator's,Teacher's etc...will be held accountable, and Parent's will be able to sue if they encounter a tragedy like mines, Lose a child to Bullying! or any kind of Bullying , Which i don't recommend to no Parent.. God Bless our Children..” -Masika Bermudez, Mother of Jaheem Herrera

^[150]

Photo Credit: Florida Sun-Times

Masika Bermudez, the mother of Jaheem Herrera, is comforted by her husband Norman Keene as they are joined by family and friends in a "prayer circle" to remember her fifth-grade son outside the family's apartment in Wesley Club Apartments, Dekalb County, Tuesday night, April 21, 2009.

Carl was an 11-year-old boy from Springfield, MA. He was a slight child and loved his schoolwork. He sang in the choir and loved to play football.^[151] By all accounts he was loved, and he was loving; feeding the needy with his mother—a director of homeless programs—and helping to create a Black History program.^[152] Just a day after taking communion on Palm Sunday, as his mother was preparing to leave to confront school authorities about the bullying, she found him hanging from an extension cord on the second floor of his family’s home.^[153] He took the only pathway to peace that he knew; freeing himself from the body that had endlessly bullied and taunted at school.^[154] His mother had attempted to intervene and stop the bullying, complaining numerous times to his school, The New Leadership Charter School, to stop the bullying to no avail.^[155] The bullying was so terribly routine, that Sirdeaner, his mother, said his tormenters were worse than the breast cancer she had beat four years prior.^[156] Carl would have turned 12 on April 17^th, only 11 days later, when thousands of students and allies around the country would march and demonstrate against anti-queer harassment at Annual Day of Silence.^[157] Carl was the fourth middle schooler to die by suicide as result of bullying.^[158] In his departure note, he apologized for leaving his family behind, expressed a deep love for them and left his pokemon collection to his younger brother.^[159] According to the CDC, at the time, suicide was the third leading cause of death for youth aged 10-24.^[160] His mother would succumb to cancer seven years later.^[161]

Jaheem Herrera was also 11.^[162] He was fifth grade elementary school student at Dunaire Elementary School in Dekalb, Georgia, a state with some of the most stringent antibullying^[163] laws.^[164] Jaheem, like Carl, did not identify as queer, trans, gay or bisexual.^[165] Yet he was routinely taunted as “faggot,” “queer,” and “homo” all the same. His family was aware of the bullying, but not its extent, and routinely complained to the school to no avail.^[166] On April 16^th, due to anti-queer bullying, Jaheem died by suicide.^[167] Though media reports mark both boys, Jaheem and Carl, as hanging themselves with belts and extension cords, they were lynched under the weight of studiously negligent schools at best; and, at worst, it was the schoolhouse who enabled, ensured and enacted the theft of their young lives.^[168] The school and independent investigation state that bullying was not the cause of Jaheem’s death; but his family and those who knew and loved him, vehemently disagree.^[169] LGBTQ youth are four times more likely to die by suicide, and those who are not accepted at home are up to nine times more likely to die by suicide, as result of feeling inescapably unwelcome in the world and spaces they inhabit.^[170]

Ra’Lasia Wright, 24, Black Trans Woman, 2024

“Jump off the edge, be yourself. You’ll be 10x happier than forcing yourself to be who people accept.”

-Ra’Lasia Wright^[171]

“I’m trans, she’s trans. She always told me none of her friends knew what she went through, you know, we live the same life..I’m very frustrated with MPD…No leads at all, only thing was they were trying to get warrants to get into her phone…I will never have a friend like her, ever again to hold my hand to tell me that it’s going to be OK…Without her, there’s no me you know she paved the way for me and my sister is gone I can’t even fathom that my sister is gone.”

-Camille Lieng, a friend & trans sister of Ra’Lasia^[172]

Ra’Lasia, a Black Puerto Rican transwoman, was born in Gary, Indiana. She moved to Minneapolis just before she turned 10 and had lived there ever since.^[173] She came out not long after, at 11, and transitioned when she was twenty years old.^[174] She had only lived four years in the body she desired, before her family received a notification from Ra’Lasia’s cell phone, alerting them that she was in an unfamiliar neighborhood.^[175] They had not heard from her since the night before.^[176] They immediately contacted the police who found her lying on the ground between two homes, unresponsive, with a gunshot wound to chest, at 12:30pm on December 1^st, 2024. She was a gifted content creator—speaking regularly and passionately about her transition and women’s issues^[177]—with a strong desire to protect and support all women and dreams to move to Atlanta or Miami in 2025.^[178] No suspects have been named, nor has any further information arisen.

Unnamed Black Trans Girl, 17, 2024

It was 11:30pm on July 20^th, 2024. I imagine that it was a mundane evening at the Miami International Airport. She—unnamed because she was 17 at time—was merely eating a meal.^[179] Then, she was allegedly ambushed without provocation by Alexander Love.^[180] Investigators reviewed surveillance footage and saw Mr. Love “lying in wait in the prone position looking towards the direction of the victim.”^[181] He stabbed her 18 times with a butcher knife in her arms, shoulders, neck, face and head and leg.^[182] He then attempted to throw her from the fourth floor, over the safety retaining glass, to the first floor.^[183] She was able to get away and find authorities.^[184] Mr. Love, 29, has been charged with attempted murder and held without bail.^[185] He told police that he “became acquainted” with the girl at the airport, further claiming he was “possibly drugged and someone inserted an unknown object in his rectum.”^[186] He then went to Target, purchased a knife and assaulted her.^[187] Both were unhoused at the time and living at the airport, which provides shelter for 20-25 unhoused people each day.^[188] Ron Book, chairman of the Miami-Dade County Homeless Trust, told the Huffington Post that his organization was currently seeking long-term housing for 29 LGBTQ youth out of the 480 unhoused youth documented in their systems. She had no secure housing and was not even safe in one of the busiest airports in the world—it handled nearly 52 million passengers in 2023 and is the second busiest in the united states for international travel—if a child can be stabbed 18 times, by an adult, in plain view of so many people, where can a child be safe?^[189] The last public report states she was in critical condition. The Human Rights Campaign has called this spate of violence an “epidemic” and noted at least 33 episodes in 2023.^[190]

Morgan Moore, 17, Black Trans Boy, 2022

“She wanted to make sure that nobody knew what was going on in this house…“She would tell [her children] if they ever called for help, that Child Protective Services would come and take away all of their siblings — who they were so closely knit to because that was the only friends they had. So she scared and brainwashed her children into thinking that they couldn’t get help.”

-Montgomery Assistant State’s Attorney Sheila Bagheri said in opening statements^[191]

““The tragic death of a child does not necessarily mean that a crime was committed…“The challenges with poverty and a system that further denigrates those less fortunate to us does not necessarily mean that a crime was committed. Cynthia is not guilty. … The state paints a picture that the house is quote-unquote horrid, but ignores that this is a family of 12 living in a townhouse with approximately a square footage of 2,000 square feet receiving Social Security income solely from Cynthia.” It may not have been what the state or the court would have done,” Martinez said. “But feeding, assisting and loving Morgan is care. In fact, the evidence will show that there was at minimum, a telehealth visit in March of 2022.”

-Assistant Public Defender Roberto Martinez told Cummins in opening statements.^[192]

“We have three perspectives on Morgan’s murder – the year he died in 2022, the year his identity as a trans teen became public 2023, and 2024 the year that I learned about his death.”

-Sue, Pittsburg Lesbian Correspondents^[193]

This is perhaps the hardest entry into the litany for survivance to recount. Not merely because Morgan was a child or because he was a BlaQueer transgender boy – that alone is difficult to sit with. It is not the poverty nor the squalid conditions of the home that he shared with his mother and father and ten siblings, seven minors and two young adults.^[194] It is not even that Morgan is dead that troubles me most; in fact, that might be a salve to their suffering. Instead, it is that he was only 79lbs—the average, healthy weight for 17-year-old cisgender girl is 112-132lbs, and 132-143lbs for a cisgender boy^[195]—with protruding ribs, with ulcers resulting from lying on the floor for months without treatment.^[196] When the paramedic arrived, Morgan was lying on a dirty living room floor in full cardiac arrest—with no discernable heartbeat or breath—in plain view of at least five of his young siblings and his parents.^[197] According to the Washington Post, the forensic pathologist in the case testified that “He found a decubitus ulcer on the child’s back, extending down to the bone, and said such wounds often form on people who can’t move. Titus said he also found healed-over, older ulcers.”^[198] He also stated that there were no available medical records for the child since he was eight years old.^[199]

The descriptions of Morgan’s living conditions were horrific. There were no working lights or toilets, and the refrigerator was locked at all times.^[200] Cats roamed and defecated freely throughout the home. The children were hungry, rarely able to shower, “homeschooled,” forbidden from talking to or making friends, reaching out to authorities or having a social life; under their parent’s threat of being separated from each other in foster care.^[201] Morgan’s death was officially ruled a homicide by way of “complications of neurological disorder”^[202] but, if intentional, the withholding care, access to food, medical attention and contact with the outside world is, as Sue notes, filicide; or the deliberate act of a parent killing their child.^[203] Investigators note he wouldn’t have died had he gotten proper treatment. Morgan was disabled and in need of care, suffering from Multiple Sclerosis, diabetes and Long COVID.^[204] I’m unprepared to argue conclusively that this qualifies as filicide, however, it is evident the conditions of Morgan’s life–and that of his siblings–is a modern example of what Saidiya Hartman calls, in the opening quotation, “the afterlives of slavery.” Again, she argues “...black lives are still imperiled and devalued by a racial calculus and a political arithmetic that were entrenched centuries ago. This is the afterlife of slavery--skewed life chances, limited access to health and education, premature death, incarceration, and impoverishment.”^[205] His life chances were skewed, his access to healthcare and education was limited, his death premature and his existence was contorted by impoverishment. While his parents bear the lifetime burden of culpability; much of the conditions of his life can be laid not merely at the feet of negligent parents–as law is wont to do–but instead at continuum of political and legal decisions that render such scenarios not only possible, but probable, for Black people from slavery to the present. Black life–even when unencumbered by antitrans animus–remains imperiled, from the womb to the womb.

I do not know his mother, Cynthia, or his father Domonique, and I make no effort here to exonerate, excuse or damn them. Both faced and avoided convictions for the murder of Morgan.^[206] Cynthia was acquitted during a bench trial, due to a lack of clear causal evidence, while Domonique avoided prosecution.^[207] However, both are awaiting sentencing for six charges of child neglect against Morgan’s siblings, facing up to 30 years in prison.^[208] There was no legal redress granted for the death of Morgan. I do not believe, and remain unconvinced, that our criminal legal system is designed for, or equipped to distribute, redress for assaults on Black life; to the contrary, it is often the very locust of harms that span generations. I do know that sometimes, home–whether a household or site of citizenship–is often where the hatred is.^[209] Whether and how the hate arose, or was distributed from his parents, the broader family, or the nation writ large is unknowable; but only hate could allow a human, a child at that, to exist under such circumstances for so long and “waste away.”^[210] It is common knowledge–and a legal fact–that parents owe a duty of care to their children; but if they are incapable, and the state only intervenes at the point of death, what is duty but a shifting of culpability for a death only made possible by collective disregard?

Morgan was “a celebrated artist, self-taught guitarist, cook, keyboard player, gamer and all-around great person” according to a relative.^[211] Montgomery State’s Attorney John McCarthy described the case as “uniquely horrific” and as involving “a shocking abandonment of parental responsibilities. It is one of the worst cases of child neglect that we have seen in the county,” ^[212] A sibling of Morgan’s said: “I just want my brother to be remembered as the artist and the person he was. He was a good person…I want people who are transphobic and not accepting of their children to accept their kids for who they are and love them no matter what.”^[213] Morgan did not receive justice and was failed by kin and country alike.

Inescapable State Violence: Understanding The Data

The fifteen records above present evidence of an epidemic and surround of antiBlaQueer and trans violence; and even These snapshots are merely snippets of snippets, both due to underreporting by BlaQueer, trans and gender expansive people and poor recording-keeping and antipathy by local law enforcement. The true amount of physical violence and other forms of harassment are likely incalculable, but it is clear that the brunt of it is experienced by people of color, overwhelmingly Black, and the vast majority of whom are Black transwomen.

In the 2015 U.S. Transgender Survey 44% of Black respondents reported being verbally harassed, and more than half (53%) were sexually assaulted at least once in their lifetime.^[214] In 2021, for example, a record year of violent fatalities, at least 59 trans people were killed.^[215] While that number dropped to 41 in 2022, 83% of victim-survivors were people of color and 54% were Black transwomen.^[216] 26% were killed by a romantic partner or someone known to them, and 56% were deadnamed–intentionally called by a prior name, before transition with the effect of delegitimizing their gender identity and their bodily autonomy–or misgendered by investigative authorities or the press.^[217] Consider that even in death and the pursuit of justice, trans folks’ existence is either denied or maligned by those entrusted with maintaining truth, transparency and public safety.

Of those killed in 2024, 50% were under the age of 25.^[218] If half of murdered trans people are killed before age 25—when the prefrontal cortex matures and allows for higher-order cognitive functions such as decision-making, impulse control, and planning—what does this say about our collective notions of both “public safety?” Put differently, who constitutes “the public,” is entitled to “safety,” and from whom? On whose behalf will the state wield violence? Who will it allow or direct the wielding of violence against? It is critical to repeat and hold these questions close; particularly when thinking about the experiences of marginalized and criminalized peoples. Data on LGBTQIA+ interactions with police is particularly instructive.“There’s notions that we’re not supposed to exist,” Bamby Salcedo, founder of the Trans Latina Coalition, told Vox. “The police have also internalized all of that and perpetuate that [violence]. So because we have to survive in some type of way, because we’re not supposed to exist in this world, we’re criminalized simply because of who we are.”^[219]

A 2015 study by the Williams Institute at UCLA School of Law found that “LGBT individuals and communities [continue to] face profiling, discrimination, and harassment at the hands of law enforcement officers.”^[220] For example, according to data from the U.S. Transgender Survey, 61% of Black respondents reported experiencing mistreatment by the police, including verbal harassment as well as physical and sexual assault.^[221] These violations and trespasses do end with initial police contact and extend throughout interaction with the criminal legal system; as transgender people are more likely to experience violence, including physical and sexual assault and injuries, by law enforcement and jail/prison staff.^[222] “Protected & Served? 2022,” a report conducted by Lambda Legal, in partnership with Black and Pink National, surveyed 2500 people and found particularly alarming of misconduct, abuse, and discrimination LGBTQ+ people and people living with HIV experience in the criminal legal system.^[223] Below is a high-level snapshot of their findings:

● Half of all participants that had engaged in sex work experienced police misconduct: About 18% of survey participants indicated that they had “exchanged sex or sexual performance for money or other things of value” in the past five years.^[224] Half experienced some form of police misconduct while working in this capacity.^[225] Participants indicated that most commonly, police took their money (26%) or demanded sex in exchange for not arresting them (18%).^[226]

● Abuse in detention is the norm, not the exception. An overwhelming majority (94.3%) of detained participants, reported experiencing abuse in prisons and jails, including one or a combination of^[227]:

● Verbal assault, physical assault, sexual harassment, sexual assault, other sexual contact, being referred to by the wrong name or pronoun, and being accused of an offense they did not commit.^[228] 

● Nearly two-thirds of those in detention experienced a two-week or longer interruption of their medication routine, including hormone replacement therapy, antiretrovirals, heart medications, and psychotropic medications.^[229]

● In the courts, transgender participants of color were more likely to have their transgender status inappropriately revealed than white trans participants (38% vs. 22%).^[230] For transgender people, respect and discretion, especially around their transgender status, is critical as being outed in a public and sensitive environment can be a danger to their safety.^[231]

● Low trust in government institutions: Participants who had face-to-face encounters with police in the past five years (57%) were less likely to trust the police than those who did not.^[232]

According to a 2013 report by the Anti-Violence Project, trans people are also 3.7 times more likely to experience violence and 7 times more likely to experience physical violence when engaging with the police than cisgender people.^[233] When engaging with the police and state apparatus, abuse and violence are the norm and not the exception. Put differently trans people, particularly BlaQueer folks, are trapped in an abusive relationship with the state that often results in skewed life chances, incalculable trauma and premature death. The more contact one has with the police, the less likely they are to trust them or other government institutions.^[234] These experiences with harassment, withholding of care, and gratuitous physical, sexual and fatal violence have the effect of creating an enclosure of harm; and trapping Black trans people within it. This has the effect of shrinking the spaces that they can safely exist in, while simultaneously excluding them from public space and public. This routinized exclusion marks them as threatening, furtive trespassers in their own country and often their own communities and homes. Take for example the tragic murder of Toni McDade, a Black trans man.

McDade had been in and out of jail for years, struggling with mental health issues.^[235] In 2009, realizing they needed urgent mental health support, they wrote to the judge in a prior case, begging for mental health treatment instead of incarceration.^[236] “I have an anger problem and always fought behind my anger,” McDade wrote, pleading to be sent to Florida State Hospital in Chattahoochee for treatment.^[237] “I NEED HELP PLEASE SIR. I have a mental problem.”^[238] Instead they were sentenced to jail on other charges. Nine years later, on May 26, 2020, McDade was viciously beaten by a group of men near his home in Tallahassee.^[239] No one intervened, no one called for help, no neighbors or passersby, instead onlookers cheered and recorded cell phone footage.^[240] The following morning, McDade was shot to death by a police officer after allegedly stabbing 21-year-old Malik Jackson, who reportedly took part in the earlier beating, in the parking lot of the Holton Street and Leon Arms apartment buildings.^[241] While the police department reported that Toni was shot after threatening the officer with a gun, multiple residents of the community dispute this;one resident saidthat the officer never warned Toni, while another witness disclosed that a white officer told Toni to “stop moving,” and called him a racial slur before opening fire.^[242] Amazingly, the name of the officer has not been released because Florida law classifies officers involved with shootings as victims who are owed anonymity.^[243]

This is particularly harrowing. A man is violently beaten outside of his home by a mob. Instead of his neighbors coming to his rescue, they laughed, cheered and took cell phone videos of the beating. The next day, he encounters one of the people who jumped him and allegedly stabs him in a non-fatal manner, likely either traumatized by what has happened before or put in a defensive posture by the conditions of their engagement. The police are then called—despite not being called when he was jumped—and, instead of inquiring about the altercation, they call him a nigger and shoot him dead. They then lie, deadname and misgender him and say he threatened them with a gun;^[244] no gun is recovered on their body and the murderous officer is treated and anonymized as a victim for murdering a victim of Black trans experience. These are the conditions of Black trans life; to be nowhere safe, to be consistently aware of the possibility of violence by neighbors, passersby, strangers and police and be prepared, perhaps, for each to occur within 24 hours with no appreciable chance of survival.

This is an illustration of what I have called both furtive Blackness and BlaQueer Furtivity^[245] and what Saidiya Hartman has titled “the afterlives of slavery.”^[246] If Toni were a white, cisgender man named Anthony, he would likely still be alive today and I’m skeptical whether they would’ve ever been jumped at all; due to the state guarantee of de jure retributive, overwhelming violence for violations of white men’s access to safety. However, Toni was not white and not a cisgender man; so he was not included in the collective imagined with “public safety,” as he did not constitute a member of “the public,” and was therefore not entitled to “safety.” Instead, it was those who assaulted him—first the jubilant mob and then the officer dripping with dutiful antiBlackness—who were understood as victims, perhaps by virtue of being made aware of, or traveling in the vicinity, of Toni’s existence. As Bamby noted above “we’re not supposed to exist in this world, we’re criminalized simply because of who we are” for Black trans people is existence is the crime and often, it is understood as a type of domestic terror, necessarily marked as a capital offense, readying one for extermination.^[247]

Crimes of Hate & Desire, The Gay/Trans Panic Defense & AntiQueerness As Mitigating Factor

Gay; adjective. Definition 1) a: of, relating to, or characterized by sexual or romantic attraction to people of one's same sex (a gay men; a gay woman in her 40s), often used to refer to men only (gay and lesbian members of the community) b: of, relating to, or intended for people who are gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, etc. (the gay rights movement; a gay bar). Definition 2)a: happily excited: merry (in a gay mood) b : keenly alive and exuberant : having or inducing high spirits (a bird's gay spring song). Definition 3)a: bright, lively (gay sunny meadows). b: brilliant in color. Definition 4: given to social pleasures also : licentious^[248]. Gay; noun. Plural: gays, sometimes disparaging + offensive; see usage paragraph below : a gay person (especially : a gay man).^[249]

Licentious; adjective. Definition 1) a: lacking legal or moral restraints, especially : disregarding sexual restraints (licentious behavior; licentious revelers). Definition 2) a: marked by disregard for strict rules of correctness, licentiously adverb, licentiousness noun^[250]

Transgender; adjective. Definition 1) a: of, relating to, or being a person whose gender identity differs from the sex the person was identified as having at birth, especially : of, relating to, or being a person whose gender identity is opposite the sex the person was identified as having at birth.^[251]

Panic; noun. Definition 1) a: a sudden overpowering fright, also : acute, extreme anxiety. b: a sudden unreasoning terror often accompanied by mass flight (widespread panic in the streets).^[252]

Defense; noun. Definition 1) a: the act or action of defending (the defense of our country; speak out in defense of justice, quickly jumped to her friend's defense). b: law : the denial, answer, or plea (see plea sense 2b) of one against whom a criminal or civil action is brought : a defendant 's denial, answer, or plea. Definition 2) a: capability of resisting attack (the body's defense against disease). b: sports : ability to keep an opponent from scoring in a game or contest : defensive play or ability (a player known for good defense). Definition 3) a: means or method of defending or protecting oneself, one's team, or another (the nation's air and ground defenses; Big shells are an effective defense against these predators as well.—Gregory P. Dietl)

The definitions above provide common grammar for thinking through the meaning of the component parts of the so-called “Gay/Trans Panic Defense.” The definition and usage of “gay” here is not in dispute and has largely become common parlance; with its derogatory usage often denoted by tone or usage such as “a gay,” which marks the subject as a departure from the norms proper and preferred human behavior. The fourth meaning of gay, licentious, or “given to social pleasures” is interesting and apt here because it not only seems to recognize common cheerful, judgement and carefree caricatures of gay, trans and queer peoples in media, but also because it appears to explicate the presumption at the root of much anti-queer and transphobic causes; that queer and trans people exist only in and as, elective, dangerous excess, that operate as moral, spiritual, political and physical danger to the collective body of the nation, that must be quelled, so that the whole can survive. The etymology of licentious here, is telling—and ironic—too, coming from the Latin word licentia whose meaning ranged from "freedom to act" to "unruly behavior, wantonness."^[253] These understandings of the word “gay” paint a picture of an impermissible freedom, a way of being without permission, that is considered wayward at best and a domestic threat to national security at worst. Freedom then, is the threat.

The definition of transgender is self-explanatory at first glance. However, as we move on to think about “panic” and “defense,” we must take a moment to imagine why discordance between someone’s consensually noted gender identity and the sex compulsorily assigned to them at birth would cause another panic? What is the source of the overpowering fright, unreasoning terror or overwhelming anxiety that compels one toward violence? Where might we locate the source, in the cases above and below; where the overpowering, the unreasoning and the overwhelming is less experienced by those wielding this defense than those who experience the violence in question? Put differently, especially in these moments of consensual and elective interactions, what is it that the non-trans person is defending against—not in the legal sense—but in the moment of violent contact? Is it the “disease” of desire elucidated by their longing for the queer person? Is protection from reputational harm due to trans or queerphobia? Or is this merely a demonstration of cisgender and/or heterosexual power to take what one will from BlaQueer and trans people, to seize our bodies—especially sexually—while also deflecting and avoiding the systemic and interpersonal isms that order and disorder how we live and die? Put differently, this defense works as both a defense against legal culpability for violence and social culpability for erotic desire and sexual (mis)conduct and both arise out of the fear of others finding out one's proximity to a furtive identity.