Ruling buoys killer’s quest for sex change

[Natasha]

Ruling buoys killer's quest for sex change

http://www.bostonherald.com/news/regional/view.bg?articleid=1341835&srvc=rss
5/31/11
By Laurel J. Sweet

A lawyer for inmate Michelle Lynne Kosilek filed a plea Thursday in his decade-old case before U.S. District Court Chief Judge Mark L. Wolf, saying a May 20 decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals in Boston for inmate Sandy Jo Battista supports Kosilek's similar claims of cruel and unusual punishment by the Department of Correction.

The ruling states DOC can no longer use inmate safety concerns, such as sexual assault, as an excuse for withholding hormone therapy from Battista, who is anatomically male, but identifies and lives as a woman.