Court Denies State’s Request to Dismiss Case Challenging Broken Health Care System for Transgender Prisoners

A federal court in Southern Illinois today denied the Illinois Department of Corrections’ request to dismiss a class-action lawsuit, Monroe v. Jeffreys, filed by five transgender women detained in Illinois prisons to reform the abysmal medical treatment that they and more than one hundred other transgender prisoners receive from the Department in its facilities throughout the state.
 
In 2019, U.S. District Court Chief Judge Nancy Rosenstengel ordered the Illinois Department of Corrections to overhaul its practices and policies for providing treatment to prisoners with gender dysphoria. Despite the Court’s order, the State has not yet implemented the great bulk of the changes the Court ordered. 
 
In response to the decision, John Knight, Director of the LGBTQ & HIV Project at the ACLU of Illinois, issued the following statement:
 
“The Illinois Department of Corrections was given a clear path forward by the Court more than a year ago – a path that would provide the basic medical care that transgender people who have gender dysphoria desperately need. After months of dragging their feet and ignoring the clear needs of our clients in their custody, the State instead sought to get out of the lawsuit, arguing that they were still planning and working toward providing the life-saving care that our clients urgently require. That is wholly inadequate for our clients, who continue to endure significant harm from existing Department policies.
 
We are pleased the Court soundly rejected the State’s effort to escape its constitutional duty to promptly reform its health care system and hope to have a chance soon to prove our case at trial.”