Feds in LA announce probe of housing biological males in women’s prisons

LOS ANGELES (KESQ) - The Justice Department has opened an investigation of allegations that female inmates of two California prisons are subject to unconstitutional risk of harm from violent biological male inmates who self-identify as transgender, officials announced today in Los Angeles.

The federal civil rights probe will look at reports of alleged sexual assaults, attempted rapes, voyeurism and a pervasive climate of sexual intimidation due to the presence of males in the California Institution for Women in Chino and the Central California Women's Facility in Chowchilla, in Madera County, prosecutors said.   

Since California's Transgender Respect, Agency, and Dignity Act took effect in January 2021, men in state prisons, including violent felons charged with sex crimes and who have intact genitals, can request transfer to women's prisons based on self-identification as transgender.

The federal government Thursday notified California Gov. Gavin Newsom of the investigation into the two prisons operated by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation to determine if the institutions unconstitutionally provided housing and preferential treatment to biological male prisoners over fully female inmates.   

First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli said in a statement that the Transgender Respect, Agency, and Dignity Act "has provided none of these qualities to the female inmates of state prisons who have been forced to share space with biological men who are violent felons. Our Constitution protects woman from having their civil rights violated by harmful state legislation wrapped in the language of `equity' and 'progress.'"

The department will investigate the prisons pursuant to its authority to determine the existence of violations of prisoners' constitutional rights that result from a "pattern or practice of resistance to the full enjoyment of such rights."

The probe is separate from the Justice Department's 2024 investigation into allegations of correctional staff sexual abuse of inmates of the same two women's prison facilities.

A CDCR spokesperson could not immediately be reached for comment.