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Loading ...Transwoman ordered to serve time in male prison
01.07.2009 10:18am EST
(Montreal, Quebec) A transsexual Quebec inmate who hasn’t physically completed the transformation to a woman has created an incarceration quagmire for federal corrections officials after being transferred into a men’s prison.
Tania Veilleux, 43, has been detained at the federal penitentiary in Sainte-Anne-des-Plaines since mid-December when she was sentenced to 40 months in prison for sexually assaulting a young girl over a four-year period.Veilleux had previously been held at the Tanguay prison for women in Montreal while awaiting sentencing, but other female inmates weren’t comfortable with her presence there.
Veilleux was formerly known as Sylvain Veilleux, but the Registrar of Civil Status of Quebec has accepted her as a female. However, federal officials have classified her as a male.
A court-appointed lawyer who assisted Veilleux at her trial says tensions boiled over at the women’s facility because while Veilleux is legally a woman, she still has male sexual organs.
At least one of female detainee didn’t appreciate sharing space with Veilleux, said lawyer Andre Boissonneault. “Legally she is a woman but she hasn’t had her operation, so she’s partly a man,” Boissonneault said.
“That caused some problems.”
Boissonneault said provincial jail officials went to great lengths to accommodate Veilleux, including keeping other inmates behind bars while she bathed and changed.
“Then she was sentenced to 40-months in prison and instead of sending her to a prison for women, they sent her to a prison for men,” Boissonneault said.
The Correctional Service of Canada was unavailable to comment on the case.
But a long-time Quebec advocate for the transgendered said it isn’t a good idea to leave Veilleux in an all-male facility.
“I don’t know how Tania will hold up in these types of facilities,” said Micheline Montreuil, a transgendered Quebec lawyer, teacher and politician who ran federally for the New Democratic Party in 2007.
“Putting her in isolation to keep her safe is probably the best – but I don’t know if that is a long-term solution.”
Montreuil said that while she herself would feel physically capable of handling herself among males, she doesn’t know how Veilleux will adjust.
Montreuil, who has visited clients in the prison where Veilleux is currently incarcerated just north of Montreal, says it is a rough institution that caters specifically to men.
“I don’t know how she’s going to react but knowing how inmates are, she could face harassment and could even be assaulted,” said Montreuil.
“So is it a good idea to put her in a male prison? No, unless of course she’s in isolation.”
Boissonneault said Veilleux has not returned his calls, but hopes to touch base with her in the coming days.
This should be more about the fact that she only got 40 mos for sexual assault and less about making fellow inmates a little more comfortable…
Most of the real trans people I know are not like you. I do not think that you are a real trans person. Whoever you are, your aggressive comments are inappropriate and unwelcome.
I support all real trans people as part of the overall goal of gender/sex liberation, whether or not they’d support me as a gay man.
…and there are real trans people who have sincere, rational concerns about the gay/lesbian/bisexual ‘community’.
?????
Tom! Please elaborate. You are completely senseless.
As much as I would love to challenge your comment, I do not even know where to start. It is way too broad and complete jiberash. Providing detail may give me enough clarity on which I can do so, but I doubt it.
Melissa: “You people seem determined to send me as well as other trans women there. I’ll just be sure to do the same to you people.”
Tom: Seems that surgery didn’t remove your Male Privilege, eh man ??
You people seem determined to send me as well as other trans women there.
I’ll just be sure to do the same to you people.
Go to hell “Melissa” !
Where a pre-op or non-op transsexual / transgender prisoner is placed is the main theme of this story. Very little details were given about the nature of the crime other than the charge and demographic information of the victim.
Male and female inmates used to be housed together during the 19th century.
The practice was ended simply to avoid pregnancy thus taxpayers having to pay for bastard children as they were called during those times.
Cissexual women were just as abused by male inmates as transsexual and transgender women are today.
Since no government will obviously sexually integrate prisons (even without certain fierce opposition from feminist groups and other human rights organization) where trans inmates are placed is critical to survival.
If trans inmates are placed with men, this sends a strong message to male inmates on what the government will allow them to do to trans women (post-op, law abiding or not)once they are released.
Rape of trans women is completely ignored if not covertly encouraged by our government. Only a few jurisdictions are just getting around to the murder problem!
Most people here seem to have no idea what threats of rape do to a woman’s emotional stability; especially when they are encouraged by other women.
Calm down, everyone. This crime is difficult to stomach, and elicits strong emotional responses from most people. However, we can still discuss our views without getting into name-calling situations.
Where transgendered people are housed is not the point of this article, however, a great question can be raised. Why do we segregate males and females in prisons at all. Should we not have better control of prisoners so that rape and violence is not allowed to occur?
Perhaps if we can move away from allowing ourselves to accept that premise, and work toward resolving the problem of freedoms in prison degenerating to violence and rape, then where transgendered people are housed can be a moot point.
First of all, I do not have a sub-community.
Transsexualism is a medical condition, not a sexual lifestyle.
Identifying as transsexual and forming community around it is just as ridiculous as women with breast cancer identifying as “breast cancerals” and men with testicle cancer identifying as “testicle cancerals” and both groups forming a community around it.
My community is the mainstream heterosexual community. Neither my boyfriend nor I have ever been a part of any trannie community.
Since we are both are of the same operation status, we can legally marry.
You people have already betrayed us with ENDA so don’t give me that.
Karma boomeranging back. Blacks done to gays last election day what gays done to transsexuals. You people got what you deserve!
Transsexuals were better off when the public did not associate them with homosexuals.
Christians including the Catholic Church used to encourage people with Gender issues to seek sex reassignment surgery much like Islam does today.
Every marital right of post-op transsexuals was achieved before the association with gays. Post-op transsexuals can marry heterosexually in Islamic nations as well.
Transsexuals can also thank lesbians like Janice Raymond for the end of government support of transsexuals.
I will continue to come here until GLAAD and other gay organizations publicly state that people like me are not a part of the LGBT community. A long as you people insist on misidentifying us; I will use that to my advantage and attack the LGBT community with vengeance! – Do onto them what they do onto me. I will address heterosexual audiences with it. I know they are not interested in helping me, but the information is useful in attacking you people.
ENDA’s Revenge boomeranging back!
Okay, Melissa, you’ve got it, we’ll stay out of your community.
I take it that means you’ll be staying out of ours, like not coming here because this is 365Gay.com, not 365transgendered.com.
You won’t ask for help in securing marriage right for you and you boyfriend, right? You won’t be asking to be included in ENDA, right? You won’t ask for support from any of the services that the LGB community has established, or come to any of our bars et cetera, right?
And when one of you goes to prison you won’t mind it if we don’t do anything to try to secure the proper listing of the convict’s gender, right?
Seriously, if you hate us so much, why come here? Do you think we’re going to support you and yours by spouting the same kind of fallacious crap at us that the radical religious right does?
40 % of all children molested are boys and 95 % of all molesters are male – FBI statistics.
Whether gays make up 2 % of the general population according to the Christian Right, 6 % according to the British Census, or 10% according to GLAAD, those numbers are all far smaller than the 40% of molested children being male.
Most of the NAMBLA sympathizers are the more gender conforming types. The percentage of NAMBLA members that would more likely be classified as studs rather than nellies is far higher than the general gay population.
Almost 100% of homosexual white pride and white power members are also studs rather than nellies.
Yet, the John Wayne Gasey’s and Jeffrey Dahmer’s of the Gay Community feel superior to the Richard Simmons’ and Ru Paul’s.
As far as crimes against children, it is obviously impossible to tell how many female abusers are lesbians and how many are straight.
Just the stories I read on this site about lesbian parents getting arrested for abusing children; usually boys, and their emotional motives is sickening!
The transsexual in this story is of all things: A Lesbian – Go figure.
Every sex crime and violent crime committ
ed against women and children by transsexual women that I read about have always been committed by transsexual LESBIANS!
You dykes need to take care of your own and leave me out of your community!
I would love nothing more than to spend the rest of my life with my transsexual boyfriend free of queers bothering me with their obnoxious insistence that I am a part of their community.
Please do me the favor and ask GLAAD to grant the petition being sent around online to seperate transsexuals from transgender and the queer community; especially hetero-transsexuals!
You advocate for the spread of rape culture towards trans-women and than act as if I am the one that is in the wrong for defending myself.
Fine! You people are just like the Christian Right.
You challenge them to stop bullying you and when you are successful, they act like they are the victims of bullying and bigotry!
Yet, you hypocrites do the same to trans-people.
Just remember; what comes around goes around!
Election day in California proved that!
There will be more of this boomeranging hypocracy to come.
The Buddists call it Karma – What you do onto others will be done onto you.
The Satanists call it Vengence – Do onto others what they do onto you!
I obviously prefer the second myself as evidenced by my postings.
“being that they (lesbians) are more mannish than most women”
Yup, and all the gay men are flaming pansies…ooh and trannies, those sexually confused child-molesters.
“For the women hear (Aleasha, Kate, Kerry)… deserve to be raped themselves”
“I bet you would love to find a young boy to rape”
“I hope the government finds justification to put all lesbians in prison with men”
Wow, rabid much? This trannie is concerned about the rape of a child molester in prison, so all dykes deserve to be raped and gay men are rapists???
This story was disturbing on so many levels, not the least of which was my suspicion about when this person transitioned (before sentencing and prison or after she decided a woman’s prison would be preferable) because I really think it is a very, very rare occurrence for a transexual woman to be a pedophile – really, I’ve never heard of another transwoman child molester. I am shocked at Melissa GI’s insistence that the women on the forum should be raped and the men want to rape. As a member of the queer community, I’d think that transwomen might face more discrimination/violence from a publicized case of pedophilia than from the “rape culture” of prisons. Not sure how much literature there is to support the idea that the culture that exists in prisons really influences the culture that exists outside of prisons. If that phonomenon were true, all men (gay/straight/trans/etc) outside of prison might have continually to fear rape from other men.