Feds investigate Washington state’s trans prison policy

The Justice Department on Tuesday began investigating how the Washington Department of Corrections and one of the state’s prisons deal with incarcerated people who identify themselves as transgender. The department said it would look into  institutional policies and practices to see whether the state engaged in a pattern of violating female prisoners’ constitutional rights at the Washington Corrections Center for Women in Gig Harbor, Wash., according to a letter addressed to Gov. Bob Ferguson.

The Justice Department said the investigation was prompted by allegations that women suffered sexual assault, rape, voyeurism, and sexual intimidation from male prisoners who had identified themselves as female. Investigators hadn’t yet reached any conclusions about the allegations, the department said. If those allegations are true, such treatment of prisoners could violate Eighth Amendment protections from cruel and unusual punishment, as well as the Civil Rights of Institutionalized Persons Act, the department said.

Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon told Gov. Ferguson that if the probe discovered systemic violations, she preferred to work with the state to change its policies rather than resort to litigation.

The Justice Department was also collecting information on the housing of men in other women’s jails and prisons in the United States, it said. 

Dig deeper: Read my report on a legal settlement requiring a Texas hospital to form a detransition clinic.