Layleen Polanco was full of energy and always up for an adventure. From her love of music, to the first time she expressed her girlhood, we’ll explore how Layleen came to discover her sense of self and found her way to New York City’s ballroom scene. As a picture begins to form of her vibrant life, we also see how it took a turn and why her demise could have been prevented.

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The life and legacy of Layleen Xtravaganza Cubilette-Polanco is at the heart of Afterlives, a podcast about trans lives we’ve lost and the ways their stories have reshaped our world. Known to light up a room, Layleen was an Afro-Latina trans woman in New York City who was sentenced to the city’s notorious jail complex on Rikers Island. She died there in 2019, at the young age of 27.

Hosted by Raquel Willis and inspired by her award-winning work on Out magazine’s Trans Obituaries Project, this 7-episode series celebrates Layleen’s vibrant life through memories from her family of origin and the community she discovered in New York’s famed ballroom scene. The series unpacks the systems that failed Layleen leading up to her death at Rikers through in-depth interviews with activists fighting against the criminalization of sex work, solitary confinement, and the epidemic of anti-trans violence.

Afterlives is the story of Layleen’s life, and the fight that continues in her name today.

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