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Trans woman was brutally raped in prison and had to be hospitalized. She was awarded $10,000 in damages.

Theo

A transgender woman who was incarcerated in a men’s prison and attacked by a male inmate in 2019 just won a lawsuit against the Department of Justice and was awarded $10,000 in damages “for her physical injuries, her pain and suffering, and her emotional distress resulting from her physical injuries.”

Grace Pinson was attacked in a Tucson prison and filed a lawsuit against the federal government, claiming it should have done more to protect her, and seeking $300,000 in damages.

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Her cellmate threatened to rape her, but staff did nothing after she pointed it out, she said. He then attempted to rape her and beat her until she was hospitalized for a broken nose.

Other inmates tried to alert staff by kicking their doors, but staff reacted too late and the damage was already done.

“An inmate who requires the voluntary cooperation of several other inmates to summon help in an emergency has no reliable means of notifying staff of an emergency,” said U.S. District Judge Rosemary Marquez.

“Insurgency alarms are the only reliable means available to inmates to notify staff of emergencies in their cells, and (Pinson’s) cell did not have a functioning alarm.”

Pinson and her lawyers explained in detail how these alarms should have been implemented, and the judge wrote in her opinion that they should have been there.

“By requiring that all … cells have a functioning hold-up alarm and requiring personnel to respond immediately to an activated hold-up alarm, the … order imposes a duty to ensure that each cell’s hold-up alarm is functioning,” Marquez wrote.

She also said that officers encouraged her to commit suicide, which exacerbated her already existing mental health problems.

In addition, the prison did not treat the cell as a crime scene and did not report the incident to the prison authorities.

When asked for comment by the Associated Press, the Federal Bureau of Prisons said it does not comment on litigation for privacy and security reasons.

The statement said: “The FBOP takes very seriously its duty to protect those entrusted to its care and to ensure the safety of correctional staff and the community.”

“We make every effort to ensure the physical safety and health of individuals housed in our facilities through a controlled environment that is safe and humane.”

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