Suicide prisoner was victim of trans bullying
A woman who hanged herself in her prison cell with shoelaces had complained that she was being victimised and picked on by other inmates because she had transitioned from being a man.
Lisa Woodhall was serving a four and half year sentence after she slashed the throat of her boyfriend’s ex-lover.
Woodhall, who had undergone gender reassignment surgery in 2004, pleaded guilty to wounding with intent at Plymouth Crown Court in September 2005.
She was found hanging in her cell at Eastwood Park Prison in Wotton-under-Edge, Gloucestershire on October 6th 2006. She was 28.
“I grow tired of this war,” she wrote in a note discovered by prison staff.
“Perhaps death is the only way out. I expect no heaven only hell.
“Perhaps I’m not dying by my own hand.
“I’m murdered by ignorance and lack of appropriate care and help.
“A secure psychiatric hospital may have offered treatment, yet I suspect this option was never looked at. I’m too logical?
“Goodbye world and goodbye to those not involved in the plot against me.”
An inquest into her death in Bristol has heard how Ms Woodhall was called a “transvestite” by fellow inmates despite her transition.
“Lisa received therapeutic treatment as part of her rehabilitation at Send Prison, in Surrey,” Detective Sergeant Ian Anderson of Avon and Somerset police told the inquest, according to Metro.co.uk.
“She talked about the issues that caused her concern, and had a particularly distressing childhood.
“She heard voices telling her to harm people and couldn’t resist much longer.”
The jury of five men and five women were asked by the coroner to consider whether the prison authorities had acted to secure Ms Woodhall’s safety.
