After a lawsuit filed by the transgender prisoner, a federal judge ruled it was unconstitutional to deny the surgery.
The American Civil Liberties Union sued the Indiana Department of Corrections in 2011 on behalf of Jonathan C. Richardson (also known as Autumn Cordellione), a transgender prisoner convicted of strangling to death his 11-month-old stepdaughter in 2001.
Indiana law prohibits, however, the Department of Corrections from using taxpayer dollars to pay for sex reassignment surgery for inmates. The ACLU claims in its lawsuit filed on August 28, 2023, that the law violates the Eighth Amendment prohibition against “cruel, unusual, and excessive punishment”.
According to the ACLU’s lawsuit, Richardson’s surgery, for which he is currently serving a 55-year sentence for reckless murder, “is medically necessary.”
Judge Richard Young sided with Cordellione’s claim and agreed with the ACLU.
The ruling says: “Ms. Cordellione’s gender dysphoria is a serious medical condition, and despite the treatments that Defendant provided to treat it, she needs gender-affirming surgical treatment to avoid a risk of severe bodily or psychological harm.”
According to the order, Cordellione must undergo sex surgery.
Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita (a Republican) said on X in a recent post that his office was still reviewing the decision of the judge, but “you can expect our office will appeal this decision.”
“An Indiana prisoner convicted of murder is asking our taxpayers to pay for his gender-altering operation! Rokita stated that Hoosiers DO NOT want this.
In the original ACLU complaint, Cordellione is said to have been diagnosed with gender dysphoria in 2020 and was prescribed testosterone blockers and female hormones. He has taken both “consistently” since then. The inmate was also provided with “panties and make-up, as well as form-fitting clothing.”
The lawsuit claims that “accordingly, it is at this point necessary to perform gender-affirming surgeries to align her physical identity with her gender identification and alleviate her gender dysphoria.”
It said: “She believes the only way to treat her gender dysphoria and the harm that it causes is by receiving gender-affirming surgeries, specifically orchiectomy, and ovarianoplasty.”
The ACLU lawsuit claims that Cordellione, who is now in prison, has been identifying as a female since he was six years old. He also says the prisoner is “a woman trapped inside a male body.”
Court documents show that Cordellione strangled to death his wife’s 11-month-old daughter on September 12, 2001, while she was working. During RCordellione’s first interview with a detective, he was calm, and “unemotional”, when describing what happened. Court documents from Indiana’s Court of Appeals demonstrate this.
Cordellione, who identifies as a Muslim, filed a civil suit against the prison chaplain last year for allegedly preventing him from wearing a Hijab outside of his immediate bed area, despite being a Muslim.
