Transgender woman sues Georgia Prison Department over allegations of sexual assault by inmates and staff

Contacted by CNN for a statement, the GDC said it had not received a copy of the lawsuit and was not commenting on any pending litigation.

Alleged sexual assault by inmates and staff

In the 12 months she had been in GDC custody since 2019, Diamond has been assaulted 14 times, says the lawsuit filed on her behalf by the Center for Constitutional Rights and the Southern Poverty Law Center.

“Ms. Diamond has repeatedly informed GDC officials … of her sexual assault and begged to be transferred to a safer facility.” Rather than respond to her urgent requests for safe housing, GDC officials ordered Ms Diamond to ‘keep her loot’ and ready to fight, ‘according to the lawsuit. “They also openly acknowledged that GDC was unable to keep Ms. Diamond safe as long as she remained a transgender woman housed in men’s facilities.”

The lawsuit says Diamond is housed in a cell that does not lock to prevent intruders, and describes several cases of abuse during his time in GDC detention, including one where an inmate went into hiding while waiting for him in a closet to assault her, and a corrections officer allegedly admitted that she was warned that the incarcerated man was hiding there before the attack, according to the lawsuit. Some of Diamond’s sexual assaults left her injured and bleeding.

On another occasion, Diamond and three other transgender inmates contacted the same officer to report gang members threatening to kill Diamond, but their concerns were dismissed, the documents said.

Three times during this year, Diamond alleges that she was assaulted by staff members, including an employee who allegedly locked her in a room twice and sexually harassed her for hours.

‘Cruel and unusual punishment’

This is not the first time Diamond has expressed concern about GDC’s treatment of her as a transgender woman.

“The abuse and neglect suffered by Ms Diamond is all the more blatant as the defendants willfully ignored an earlier judicial finding that the same conduct repeated by the defendants qualifies as cruel and unusual punishment under the Eighth Amendment. and violation of clearly established constitutional rights. Says the trial.

Diamond filed his first complaint against the department in 2015 while incarcerated. The case was eventually settled, but during litigation the court ruled it unconstitutional for the department not to protect her.

Diamond was paroled later in 2015 and returned to the corrections department in 2019 for a “technical parole violation,” the statement said.

Although a GDC psychologist concluded that refusing her treatments would jeopardize Diamond’s physical and psychological well-being, she was again denied hormonal treatment, which resulted in distress, attempts to self-harm and castration and suicide attempts, says the lawsuit.

According to his lawyers, Diamond has been on hormone therapy for 17 years.

According to the document, Diamond’s thoughts of suicide, self-harm, and sexual assault resulted in PTSD.

“Being in prison and having been brutally raped seven times left me with mental scars,” she said. “The fabric of trust that I have in the authorities has been broken, especially with those the state has designated as my guardians,” Diamond said in a statement from his lawyers.

“I hope the future is better for people like me,” Diamond said in the statement. “I hope this trial will forever change the way trans people are treated in Georgia. This fight is not just my fight, it’s our fight.”