California Prisons Fail to Uphold Transgender Rights Despite State Law

California’s Transgender Respect, Agency and Dignity Act was meant to protect transgender people, reducing the trauma of physical and sexual assault experienced by many transgender women in particular when housed in men’s prison. But the culture at state prisons and rising anti-trans fervor throughout the country have exposed some transgender women to new traumas. Like Syiaah Skylit, who is currently in solitary confinement at the Central California Women’s Facility in Chowchilla. She’s experienced harassment, taunting, and attacks from other incarcerated women because of her gender identity. Reporter Lee Romney, who covered criminal justice at the LA Times, and Jenny Johnson, a former public defender, spent a year interviewing Syiaah and other transgender incarcerated people  to gauge how the law – meant to protect gender-expansive people in prison–  may not actually be working out the way it was intended.

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