Police Beating of Transgender Woman Ignites Controversy
by Renee Baker
EDGE Contributor
Friday Jun 27, 2008
http://www.edgeboston.com/index.php?ch=news&sc=local&sc2=features&sc3=&id=76579It's been over forty years since Martin Luther King Jr.'s embarked on his impassioned civil rights crusade, battled with police forces and ultimately was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee. The recent beating of an African American transgender woman, Duanna Johnson, suggests that discriminatory police brutality in Memphis has not ended. WMC-TV in Memphis recently obtained surveillance footage from the reception room of a local police station, where Johnson was beaten and maced by two police officers.
It's "every trans-person's nightmare come true," says Donna Rose, transgender woman and a leader in several national GLBT organizations.
