Incarcerated trans people are ten times as likely to be sexually assaulted by their incarcerated peers and five times as likely to be sexually assaulted by staff.
Denying medical care and medically necessary treatment to incarcerated trans people is inhumane and against the Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which reads:
Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.
Resources for Trans People Who Are Currently Incarcerated
Black and Pink Massachusetts
PO Box 1718
Jamaica Plain, MA 02130
Email: info@BlackAndPinkMA.org
Black and Pink MA is the only abolitionist org in MA to exclusively serve incarcerated and formerly incarcerated LGBTQ+ / people living with HIV including pen-pals, bail support, housing, and court support. Submissions for the newsletter are welcomed.
ACLU: The LGBT Project and Prisoners Rights Project
The LGBT Project works for an America free of discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. The ACLU National Prison Project is dedicated to ensuring that our nation’s prisons, jails, and other places of detention comply with the Constitution, domestic law, and international human rights principles, and to ending the policies that have given the United States the highest incarceration rate in the world.
Sylvia Rivera Law Project (works with NYC trans people only)
Provides free legal services for low income people and people of color who are trans, intersex, or gender non-conforming, including issues related to housing, employment, foster care, welfare, benefits, immigration, school, and the criminal justice system in the New York City area ONLY.
A national human rights organization that works to put an end to sexual violence against men, women, and youth in all forms of detention.
Prison Book Program
c/o Lucy Parsons Bookstore
358A Centre Street
Jamaica Plain, MA 02130
Phone: (617) 522-6098
Prison Book Program gives books to individuals incarcerated in the United States. Prisoners have limited access to educational materials, and we provide them with free books for personal development during incarceration. The Prison Book program takes donated books. Email: lucyparsons.center@protonmail.com
MTPC is also a book drop-off site for paperback books on trans topics. Please see the Prison Book Programs Do’s and Don’ts for donating books. Email info@masstpc.org for more information about donating directly to MTPC
Transgender Gender Variant Intersex Justice Project (TGIJP)
370 Turk Street #370
San Francisco, CA 94102
The TGI Justice Project’s (TGIJP) mission is to challenge and end the human rights abuses committed against transgender, gender variant/genderqueer, and intersex (TGI) people in California prisons and beyond.
POWER INSIDE
P.O. Box 4796
Baltimore, MD 21211
Works with women including trans women and trans men who feel they would benefit from women-centered services. They offer support and advocacy for those who are incarcerated, homeless, addicted, or engaged in sex work.
How to earn your degree and get hired after incarceration
Formerly incarcerated individuals face unique challenges in their education and employment. This guide is designed to help those people overcome these obstacles and provides resources to help them seek education or find a career.
Resources not specific to trans people:
Massachusetts Correctional Legal Services (MCLS, Inc.)
Eight Winter Street, 11th Floor
Boston, MA 02108
MCLS provides civil legal services to people in Massachusetts prisons and jails. The office does not provide criminal defense services. The office focuses on four issues: health and mental health care, guard-on-prisoner violence, physical conditions of confinement, and segregation and isolation. MCLS addresses these problems through administrative advocacy, legislative advocacy, giving information to prisoners about their rights and how to pursue them, referrals to private attorneys, and some individual and class action litigation. MCLS is also known as Prisoners’ Legal Services.
Families for Justice as Healing
100r Warren Street
Roxbury, MA 02119
Phone: (617) 905-2026
Families for Justice as Healing organizes formerly incarcerated women to join the movement toward creating alternatives to mass incarceration.
Criminal Offender Record Information (CORI) Information
Info from Mass Legal Services about CORI
Info from Mass Legal Help about CORI
MTPC works to ensure that trans people who are incarcerated dress in alignment with their gender identity and are not denied access to medically necessary trans-related health care, canteen items, trans-related educational materials, and books, and/or visitors. Contact us if you know someone currently incarcerated who is experiencing discrimination based on gender identity or gender expression.
