Link (http://kdka.com/local/local_story_005071400.html)
It all started on Wednesday, when Detective Jeffrey Smith was shot in West Oakland during a prostitution sting.
[...]
Initially, the shooter was described as a woman, then a man believed to be a cross-dresser.
It's strange that in the first paragraph they refer to the suspect as a transvestite and then as the story proceeds they then refer to him as a cross-dresser. Now I know that there is a big difference between the two terms.
Gina
Actually the word transvestite is for one who dresses in the gender opposite to their birth gender. The term cross dresser has been slowly replacing the word transvestite.