Justice Department Sues Utah Prison System for Discrimination Based on Gender Dysphoria

The Justice Department filed a lawsuit today against the State of Utah, including the Utah Department of Corrections (UDOC), alleging violations of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) for discriminating against an incarcerated transgender woman on the basis of her disability, gender dysphoria. The department’s complaint alleges that UDOC failed to provide the complainant equal access to health care services after she repeatedly requested hormone therapy, and also failed to make reasonable modifications to its policies and practices to treat her gender dysphoria. Before filing this lawsuit, the department gave UDOC written notice of its findings and an outline of remedial measures necessary to address them.

Gender dysphoria is a serious medical condition marked by clinically significant distress caused by an incongruence between the sex an individual is assigned at birth and their gender identity. Left untreated, individuals with gender dysphoria can experience serious adverse mental health outcomes.

“People with gender dysphoria, including those held in jails and prisons, are protected by the Americans with Disabilities Act and are entitled to equal access to medical care just like anyone else with a disability,” said Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division. “Delays or refusals to provide medical treatment for people with gender dysphoria can cause irreparable harm, including debilitating distress, depression, attempts at self-treatment and even death by suicide. The Civil Rights Division is committed to protecting the rights of all people with disabilities in our country, including those who experience gender dysphoria – and those rights are not given up at the jailhouse door.”

The department’s complaint alleges that UDOC imposes unnecessary barriers to treatment for incarcerated individuals with gender dysphoria that are not required for other health conditions, and unnecessarily delayed the complainant’s treatment. The complaint also alleges that UDOC failed to grant the complainant’s requests for reasonable modifications, including permitting her to purchase female clothing and personal items in the commissary, modifying pat search policies and appropriately assessing her housing requests to avoid discrimination on the basis of gender dysphoria. As a result, her gender dysphoria worsened during her incarceration at UDOC. Twenty-two months after entering custody, she performed dangerous self-surgery and removed her own testicles.

The department’s lawsuit is part of its broader efforts to combat discrimination against individuals with gender dysphoria. These include the Civil Rights Division’s recently filed statement of interest clarifying that gender dysphoria can be a covered disability under the ADA and explaining that correctional institutions violate the Eighth Amendment when they categorically refuse to provide medically necessary gender-affirming care to incarcerated individuals with gender dysphoria and a challenge to Tennessee’s SB1 which makes it unlawful to provide or offer to provide certain types of medical care for transgender minors with diagnosed gender dysphoria.

The Civil Rights Division’s Disability Rights Section is handling this matter in collaboration with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Utah.

For more information on the Civil Rights Division, please visit www.justice.gov/crt. For more information on the ADA, please call the department’s toll-free ADA Information Line at 1-800-514-0301 (TTY 1-833-610-1264) or visit www.ada.gov.