Transsexual raped 2,000 times in Australian prison pushes for assignment in female prison even if he has still male genital
In September 2015, Caitlyn Jenner filed a petition with the Los Angeles Superior Court to be officially declared a woman even if the former Olympics gold medalist still has a penis. The move was seen as a legal tactics to avoid being sent to a male prison and risk being raped if he lost an ongoing vehicular accident lawsuit then which resulted in the death of an old woman.
The same strategy is being pushed by a former prisoner, a transgender woman, who was jailed in the 1990s at the Boggo Road prison in Queensland, Australia. Just hours after Mary (not her real name) was sent to the male prison, she was sexually harassed by the male inmates.
According to news.com.au, Mary claims that she was raped about 2,000 times over four years that she spent in Australian prisons. She is now pushing to change the current policy that mandates transsexuals who have not undergone surgery to have their male genitals removed must remain in male prison, while post-operative transsexuals could stay in female prisons.
She explains, “If a transgender person is genuine and they are living as the opposite sex, then they should be house in a female prison, even if you’re in a wing on your own.” Otherwise, the pre-operative transgender would be raped frequently.
Mary recalls that upon her transfer to Boggo Road, during her first hours, she was convinced by the male inmates to have sex with them in return for protection. “Once you perform the requested threat of sex, you are then an easy target as others want their share of sex with you, which is more like rape than consensual sex,” she explains.
She describes her stint in Boggo as a “hell on earth” that Mary attempted to escape thrice to be labelled a high-risk inmate and be moved to maximum security where the most violent prisoners are sent just to get away from daily rape in regular cells.
A National Institute of Justice report says that of the 60,500 inmates across the US, about 4.5 percent reported experiencing sexual violence from unwanted touching to rape. The report was based on a recent Bureau of Justice Statistics survey of state and federal inmates.
Among the physical and psychological injuries caused by male prison rape are rectal soreness which could last for days, fear of contracting HIV, nightmares, depression, thoughts of suicide, mental trauma and deep and permanent psychological injury on rape victims, says a Human Rights Watch report.
