This is the transwoman whose beating by a Memphis cop was caught on tape. It is not surprising that this is not the only incident:
After the video leaves off, she was taken to a trauma center in Memphis (incidentally, the officer who beat her up was supposed to be the one to accompany her down there, but she objected to that). They didn’t want to treat her head wounds because they didn’t want to touch her weave, and she says she felt like they just didn’t want to touch her at all.
In all, she suffered from lacerations and contusions on her head, scarring and bruising on her side, and permanent nerve damage on the left wrist from the handcuffs.
After that, she was held in jail for several days until she could post bond.
All this, for what? Because she was presenting the wrong gender, had the wrong skin color, and walking down the wrong street?
Since the release of the video last week, Wells said that he received a “tremendous number” of phone calls from people who had gone through similar incidents, with McRae and other officers. Looking at the case history, he said that the department’s constant defense in the few cases that make it to trial is that this is just one bad cop.
Read more here.
Good Lord–this is the first I’ve heard of this incident. I am shocked (but not surprised) that a cop can get away with such behavior in the 21st century. Too bad that so many cops tend to be men whose sexuality is SO easily threatened.
Has the LGBT community started calling attention to the issue yet? I know Memphis has a large and vibrant community up there…
I would hope that is the case. I found out about it via bloggers that I think are in other areas. This happened in February and I just found out about it a few days ago.
[...] November 10, 2008 by harrietsdaughter Duanna Johnson was beaten by police officers in Memphis last June. [...]