Chicago Police Department Adopts Policy For Handling Transgender Detainees
By Samantha Abernethy
September 6, 2012 5:00 PM
http://chicagoist.com/2012/09/06/police_transgender_policy.php (http://chicagoist.com/2012/09/06/police_transgender_policy.php)
The Chicago Police Department adopted a new policy for handling transgender detainees that activists are calling "a huge step forward." The policy mandates police no longer search transgender people in an attempt to determine their gender. It also informs officers to respect preferred names and pronouns and to "not exhibit any bias, prejudice, or discriminate against a TIGN individual or group of TIGN individuals."
Police Superintendant Garry McCarthy signed the directive, and CPD will be trained. The full directive is available on the Chicago Police website and includes definitions for terms like "cross-dresser" and "intersex," as well as guiding principles and explanations of gender classification.
Chicago Police Department adopts transgender policy
by Kate Sosin, Windy City Times
2012-09-04
http://www.windycitymediagroup.com/lgbt/Chicago-Police-Department-adopts-transgender-policy/39316.html (http://www.windycitymediagroup.com/lgbt/Chicago-Police-Department-adopts-transgender-policy/39316.html)
After more than two years of pushing by transgender-rights advocates, the Chicago Police Department (CPD) has quietly adopted a general order that mandates the respectful treatment of transgender detainees.
The policy has been a major goal of more than 30 community groups, which pushed for the order both within CPD and through a proposed city ordinance.
According to the CPD website, the policy went into effect Aug. 22.
"This general order is a huge step forward in a couple of ways," said Jennifer Ritter, executive director or Lakeview Action Coalition (LAC), which began work on the order in 2010.
The order mandates that police not search transgender people in an attempt to determine their gender, that officers respect preferred names and pronouns for transgender detainees and that they not use someone's gender identity as assumed cause for a crime. It further bans derogatory language against trans people.
The policy comes after years of complaints from transgender women who report that police stop them for walking at night on the assumption that they are engaged in sex work.
It remains unclear why CPD adopted the policy without announcement. LAC had been drafting the policy with CPD for more than two years, but first heard of its adoption through a request to comment from Windy City Times.
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Read the directive here: http://directives.chicagopolice.org/directives/data/a7a57b38-1394a4ae-75313-94a4-b606a68cfab99615.html?hl=true (http://directives.chicagopolice.org/directives/data/a7a57b38-1394a4ae-75313-94a4-b606a68cfab99615.html?hl=true)
-MadelineB