Transgender Murder Victims

In 2015 there were 21 recorded deaths of transgender women, as of November 2016 there have been 26 recorded deaths of transgender individuals. Twenty deaths during a year may not come as a shock to the population as a whole, but when all of the deaths are out of an estimated 0.6% of the total population the numbers, it becomes more striking.

While murders and crimes are often reported in the media, transgender deaths go unreported in the mainstream media. There is almost no media coverage of transgender homicides. This creates greater danger for the transgender community because the general public, and even the transgender community remains blind to the hateful homicides going on around them.

Bringing these deaths to the public’s attention can lessen the current divide between the general population and the transgender community. With more media coverage the public would not only be aware of the hateful deaths, but it would also open their eyes to the hate and the potential dangers that the transgender community faces.

Since 2013 there have been 79 reported transgender homicides. Some of these cases have had suspects prosecuted, none of them have been prosecuted as a hate crime. The number of homicides does not include those who have been misgendered by the police, the news, or their families.

Here is the Advocate’s current list of those from the transgender community that have been murdered in 2016: http://www.advocate.com/transgender/2016/10/14/these-are-trans-people-killed-2016#slide-0.

The Advocate put together a slide show containing information about the 26 individuals murdered so far this year and the lives that they lived.