Dallas police identify and misgender trans woman found dead in a creek
(Dallas Police Department)
Dallas police have identified the trans woman whose body was found in a creek earlier this month.
The body belongs to Nicole Hall, a 39-year-old woman, the Dallas Police Department said on Tuesday.
The force initially misgendered Hall by referring to her as a “black male.” The tweet was later deleted and replaced with a second tweet correctly referring to Hall as a “transgender female.”
Police announce identity of trans woman found in creek (Twitter)
However, the Dallas PD elicited more backlash because they referred to the victim by her deadname and not by her chosen name.
“Her name was Nicole. People knew her as Nicole. She lived her life as Nicole,” wrote one Twitter user.
Hall’s body was found by a kayaker on May 12 in White Rock Creek, Dallas. Identification proved difficult, as the body was badly decomposed.
According to local Fox News affiliate, the police produced several sketches of Hall’s face, asking people to come forward with information.
When her body was fished out of the water, Hall was wearing a T-shirt and black scrub pants. Before she could be identified, police described her as: “[a] black, transgender female approximately 5 feet, 3 inches, and weighing about 130 pounds.”
Hall was the 10th trans person to be found dead in the US this year. The cause of her death is yet to be determined.
However, the force said there was no evidence that Hall’s death was linked to the murder of Carla Patricia Flores-Pavon, who was strangled to death in her North Dallas apartment earlier in May.
- (Carla Patricia Flores-Pavon / Facebook)
A suspect was arrested following a police investigation.
24 year old Jimmy Eugene Johnson III admitted to meeting up with and stealing from Flores-Pavon.
According to Dallas police, Johnson and Flores-Pavon met through an online chatroom.
Police ruled out a hate crime, stating that the victim was not targeted for her “transgender lifestyle,” and that the motive was purely robbery.
A vigil was held for her on May 16 at Dallas’ Cathedral of Hope.
On May 13, another transgender individual was murdered in Georgia, becoming the 11th trans death in the US in 2018.
Nina Fortson – also known as Nino Starr – was a trans-masculine and gender non-conforming Atlanta performer.
Fortson was shot dead after getting into an argument with four other people.
Atlanta police are not treating the case as a transphobic attack.
“Our preliminary investigation did not in any way indicate that this individual identified as transgender. We had no evidence that such an identification played any role in this death,” said a spokesperson for the Atlanta police department.
Fortson was also misgendered by local police forces.
28 trans people were killed in 2017 alone, making it the year with the highest number of homicides targeting trans or non-binary people in the US.
