Norsworthy had been at the center of a contentious fight between herself and the state of California, whom she had petitioned to pay for sex reassignment surgery. It was scheduled for July, but delayed after an appeal.
Advertisement
Jerry Brown declared that they would not ever need any behavior throughout the state’s Board of Parole Hearings’ explanations than a transgender patient really should be out of penitentiary.
The 51-year old inmate has been in prison since she was 21, after being convicted in the shooting of Franklin Gordon Liefer, Jr.in Fullerton in November of 1985.
“It is both incredible for our client, Shiloh, who will finally get the medical care she desperately needs, and for all transgender people throughout the California prison system”, Turner said.
In 2009, Norsworthy was the victim of a rape, which led her to become an advocate for rape-prevention policies while in prison. Quine is serving a life sentence without parole for murder.
“Sex reassignment surgery is medically necessary to prevent Ms. Quine from suffering significant illness or disability, and to alleviate severe pain caused by her gender dysphoria”, wrote Richard Carroll, a clinical psychologist and director of the Sexual Disorders and Couple Therapy Program at Northwestern University in Chicago.
A California parole board has recommended that Michelle-Lael Norsworthy be released from prison.
The CDCR agreed to a similar surgery for a 56-year-old inmate this Friday. Prison records refer to her by her birth name of Jeffrey Bryan Norsworthy, though she has lived as a woman since the 1990s.
The state of California has agreed to pay for the trans inmate’s gender reassignment surgery – however, it is still undecided whether or not an inmate having access to this type of surgery should be able to do so as a constitutional right.
Advertisement
Tigar had been on the bench less than two years last fall when he assigned himself to Quine’s complaint and appointed a team of lawyers at a San Francisco firm and at the Transgender Law Center to represent her. That inmate’s mental health was assessed by a professional who concluded that the procedure was a medical necessity for him.
