The shooting death of Rasheeda Williams, who was acting on behalf of Koko Da Doll, a 35-year-old transgender woman of African descent, on April 18 near a shopping center in Atlanta, Georgia, added to a long list of attacks and crimes against this sector of the population, where Afro-descendant transgender women represent 73 percent of all transgender victims of firearm homicides.
That figure, according to the 2017-2022 Transgender Homicide Tracker, which also notes that the vast majority of three-quarters of confirmed homicides against transgender people have involved a firearm.
According to a 2020 report by the nonprofit Human Rights Campaign ?HRC?, more than 10,000 hate crimes in the United States involve a firearm each year, which is equivalent to more than 28 per day.
The report also points to a sharp increase in anti-LGBTQ+ hate crimes, especially against transgender people, while advocates saw a 43 percent increase in the formation of anti-LGBTQ+ hate groups in 2019.
Koko was a successful rapper, working on new music, and starred in the Sundance Film Festival award-winning documentary, "Kokomo City," a documentary chronicling the lives of four black trans sex workers.
Koko's death is "at least" the 10th violent murder of a transgender or gender nonconforming person in 2023, and the third transgender or gender nonconforming person to be killed in Georgia this year alone, following the deaths of Little Turtle, 26 years old, and Ashley Burton, 37, specified HRC.
«We say ?at least? because all too often these deaths go unreported, or are misreported. Koko and Ashley, two black transgender women, were murdered just a week apart," the organization said.
"Koko's death is devastating. She was a great inspiration to many black trans youth in the community and her loss will continue to be deeply felt for generations. Koko's endless creative talents and passion to always do the right thing were cut short by senseless gun violence," said Tori Cooper, HRC's Director of Community Engagement for the Transgender Justice Initiative.
“I am outraged: This country's epidemic of gun violence is especially troubling to those of us who are simply trying to live the fullness of our lives. We must work on all fronts to end violence and the stigma that perpetuates it. As we mourn Koko along with family and friends, we call for absolute transparency and fairness from the police and public officials," he added.
At the state level, transgender and gender non-conforming people in Georgia are not explicitly protected from discrimination in employment, housing, education and public spaces, the organization denounced.
In that regard, he noted that Georgia does not include sexual orientation and/or gender identity as a protected characteristic in its hate crime law.
“It is clear that fatal violence disproportionately affects transgender women of color, especially Black transgender women. The intersections of racism, transphobia, sexism, biphobia, and homophobia conspire to deprive them of the necessities to live and thrive, so we must all work together to cultivate acceptance, reject hate, and end stigma for everyone in the trans community and non-conforming gender," HRC stressed in a statement.
This publication was supported in whole or part by funding provided by the State of California, administered by the California State Library.
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