Georgia
In 2006 Vandiver Elizabeth Glenn (only that was not her name at the time) told her supervisor that she was in the process of transitioning from male to female. Vandy Beth's job at the time was to edit the text of legislation. She first appeared in women's clothing at work at an office Halloween party. Sewell Brumby, who at the time was head of the Office of Legislative Council, told her that her choice of attire was inappropriate and that she should leave.
It’s unsettling to think of someone dressed in women’s clothing with male sexual organs inside that clothing. It's unnatural.
--Brumby, in pretrial testimony
When time came for Vandy Beth to transition at work, as we must do as part of the sex-reassignment process, her supervisor told Brumby about it and Glenn was called in to his office. When she answered affirmatively that she was intending to transition into a woman, Brumby fired her.
Brumby retired this past August. Probably into the 19th century.
A three judge 11th Circuit panel is reviewing the state's appeal of ruling by Us District Judge Richard Story, who found that Glenn was a victim of sex discrimination. Story had ordered that Glenn be returned to her job and be no longer discriminated against.
Brumby, who headed the counsel’s office from 1978 until he retired in August, also testified that he was concerned that “some members of the Legislature would view that taking place within our office as perhaps immoral, perhaps unnatural and perhaps, if you will, liberal or ultra-liberal.”
Judges on the panel cited a 1989 US Supreme Court decision that found that it was illegal to discriminate against employees because of their sex and also illegal to discriminate against those who don't conform to the stereotypes associated with their biological sex.
You can’t discriminate against someone because they don’t behave the way you expect them to behave because of their sex.
It looks to me you got a big problem based on what the U.S. Supreme Court said. We have direct evidence of intentional discrimination, it seems to me.
--Judge Bill Pryor to Richard Sheinis, representing the State of Georgia
Judge Rosemary Barkett agreed with Pryor and told Sheinis that she had no understanding of the basis of the state's arguments.
Sheinis had argued that Glenn’s firing was not motivated by gender stereotyping, but instead by her transitioning from man to woman while working at the Office of Legislative Counsel.
Texas
Rebecca Louise Robertson and James Allan Scott married in Dallas in 1998, after they had already lived together for more than a decade. At the time Robertson was well aware that Scott (shown at the right with his lawyer) was a transman. But marital bliss sometimes has a finite lifespan, and in 2010, Robertson sought to have their marriage declared void based on the fact that Scott had been born female and that the state of Texas prohibits same-sex marriage. Scott has countersued for divorce.
In 1999 a San Antonio court found in Littleton v Prange that sex was determined at birth and could never be changed. Critics argue that Littleton v Prange is unconstitutional and in any case not binding on other parts of Texas.
Earlier this year Nikki Araguz began a struggle to obtain the death benefits she felt she was due as the wife of a Wharton County firefighter who died in the line of duty. A district county judge ruled against her, granting summary judgment to her husband's family, which had filed suit to invalidate the marriage because Araguz had been born a man. Araguz has appealed the ruling.
Judge Lori Chrisman Hockett has ruled in the matter of the Robertson/Scott marriage, declining to void the marriage and allowing it to proceed as a divorce.
To our knowledge, this is the first time any Texas court has ruled that a transsexual man who marries a biological woman is in a legitimate marriage.
--Attorney Eric Gormly
Texas AG Greg Abbott, who has intervened in two recent divorce cases involving same-sex couples has so far declined to be involved in Scott v Robertson, although Robertson's attorney says he has contacted Abbott.
This coming weekend, the 57-year-old Scott will move out of a five-bedroom, 3,200-square foot house in Cedar Hill — and into a small rental cottage. Scott is being evicted after the house, which the couple built together in 2001, went into foreclosure.
Scott is disabled from scoliosis.
She stands to inherit a good deal of money that she doesn’t want me to get my hands on. I didn’t marry her for money. I married her because I loved her. I just want what I would have gotten in a regular divorce.
--James Allan Scott
Florida
Finally, we come to the
legal situation of Erica Kay in Panama City, FL. In September of 2007 Ms. Kay, who had her sex reassigned after being diagnosed with Linefelters Syndrome (so she is actually intersex, not transgender, but to many people, that's splitting hairs) in 1967, was convicted of grand theft and sentenced to five years probation.
As far as can ascertain without doing considerably more research, Ms. Kay was outed as being transgender by the tabloid press, which even provided her birth name.
According to attorney Susan Rodgers, Detective Rosier arrested Ms. Kay solely based on the allegations made in the tabloid articles, which he later admitted were false. In her statement to the press Ms. Kay states, "by then it was too late. The State Attorney's office insisted on continuing with the prosecution and continued to claim during the trial that I had closed the business and skipped town."
In fact, according to Ms. Kay, her business partner and their financial records, she had fallen ill and could not complete the work she had been paid to perform.
After being arrested, she was repeatedly humiliated by being subjected to "sex verifications, usually in police station bathrooms, at the orders of Detective Aaron Wilson. In addition Detective Rosier couldn't stop himself from listing her sex as male on the arrest warrant. Then the state attorney listed her birth name on the indictment, a name which hadn't been used to 43 years and could only have been gotten from the tabloid article.
All this, of course, was a matter of public record and was distributed widely by the local press. This lead to Ms. Kay receiving death threats, emotional abuse and abuse of her property, and discrimination. And of course, she has been summarily denied police protection. This situation has continued to this day.
On November 22, 2010 the court of appeals overturned Ms. Kay's conviction, since no proof had been given of the necessary element of intent. There had never been
grounds for arrest, trial or conviction.
A year and a day after that ruling, having waited as long as possible, the State Attorney hand-delivered a motion to close the case, eliminating the need for a hearing that was scheduled.
Ms. Kay filed Notice of Intent to Sue on September 26, 2011, served by her attorney, to the State AG and the cities of Panama City and Parker, Florida accusing them of gender discrimination, false arrest, and malicious prosecution. Such notice is required 180 days before suing the state. She plans to file her suit in US District Court.
After being served, Detective Aaron Wilson issued a warrant for Kay's arrest. Wilson went so far as contacting Kay's attorney to demanding to know Kay's whereabouts.
That warrant was not quashed until late October.
Ms. Kay has a blog.
