politics

I support trans women and...

This was a defendant who knew the victim well. They were in an ongoing sexual relationship. The trial court made it very difficult for the defendant to discuss their relationship or concerns about being hurt during alleged self-defense. And that was defendant's entire legal defense! And he couldn't talk about it! Even if too many trans women are being killed, this is not an unfair or bad appellate ruling.

Defendants should be able to present defenses to a jury. This is absolutely not transphobia for the court to rule this way. It's entirely possible Defendant chose to not testify because of this ruling. In a self-defense case!

The ruling: https://www.tncourts.gov/sites/default/files/OpinionsPDFVersion/W2025-01186-CCA-R3-CDOPN.pdf

According to the ruling:

At the pretrial hearing on the State’s motion, defense counsel expressed concern that if the trial court excluded evidence of the victim’s biological sex, it would impact Defendant’s ability to present a defense and his right to testify. Defense counsel stated that if Defendant chose to testify, he would be in a position to have to lie to the jury, “either by omission or just a straight-out lie.”

So defendant was allowed to testify, but couldn't mention that the victim was trans at all. It's not right. Defendants should be able to present their side of things.

from the actual ruling:

Logically, courts allow evidence of the physical characteristics of the victim and defendant when evaluating the “reasonableness” and “imminent danger” requirements of a self-defense claim. Here, Defendant argues the “differences in strength and power between a biological man and a woman of the same weight cannot be denied.” In other words, there are physical differences between a biological male who is five-feet-eleven and 262 pounds and a biological female who is five-feet-eleven and 262 pounds. The trial court determined that because the victim was armed, evidence of her biological sex was irrelevant and potentially prejudicial. We disagree.

While a gun might equalize differences in physical strength and size, there are other inherent physiological differences between the sexes that science continues to reveal and that we choose not to ignore. A detailed discussion is not necessary for our analysis; it suffices to acknowledge that these differences exist. However significant or insignificant these differences are, the Tennessee Rules of Evidence set the threshold test for relevance low: evidence is relevant if it has any tendency to prove a consequential fact. See Tenn. R. Evid. 401, Advisory Comm’n Cmt. (“The theoretical test for admissibility is a lenient one . . .”). We decline to hold that the biological sex of the victim is not relevant to a claim of self-defense.

Regarding the danger of unfair prejudice, we recognize that societal biases exist. As counsel for Defendant observed at the pretrial hearing, any prejudices the jury might have against the victim for being transgender could very well be applied to Defendant for being in a sexual relationship with the transgender victim. The trial court was concerned that knowledge of the victim’s biological sex might lead to bias and cause the jury to confuse the issues. The danger of bias, however, ran both ways in this case. Defendant expressed his concern that the jury might be less likely to accept his claim of self-defense based on their understanding of the victim as a woman rather than a biological male. Notably, the victim’s friend, Mr. Hunter, testified the victim called him because the victim thought he could provide some level of intimidation as a male. These societal views on the differences between male and female behaviors only strengthen our belief that a person’s biological sex has relevance to certain issues.