Nemesis
03-17-2004, 02:42 PM
03/17/04
John Nolan
Associated Press
Cincinnati - An appeals court on Tuesday revived a lawsuit by a transsexual former Ohio prison inmate who alleged that corrections officials failed to keep her safe from attack.
The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled 2-1 to send the lawsuit by the former prisoner, Traci Greene, back to U.S. District Judge Sandra Beckwith in Cincinnati for reconsideration.
The Ohio attorney general's office is reviewing the decision and has not decided whether to appeal it or proceed to trial, spokeswoman Michelle Gatchell said.
Greene's lawyer, Alphonse Gerhardstein, said he is looking forward to a trial of the lawsuit. Transsexual inmates are vulnerable to attacks by other prisoners, and the state was obliged to keep Greene safe, Gerhardstein said.
"Prison systems have a duty to safely house inmates, and locking Traci Greene with Hiawatha Frezzell was a clear breach of that duty," Gerhardstein said.
Frezzell assaulted Greene several times, according to court testimony, and one of the attacks, in July 1996, was a beating with a mop handle and a 50-pound fire extinguisher.
Two of the three judges ruled that Greene had presented evidence that a jury should consider whether Anthony Brigano, then the warden at Warren Correctional Institution, was indifferent to Greene's safety by placing her in protective custody with a prisoner with a history of assaulting other inmates.
Greene was sent to the Ohio Reformatory for Women in 1993 after being convicted of misuse of credit cards in Toledo, officials said. Greene was transferred three days later to the Warren prison - which houses men - when state administrators concluded that her sex change wasn't complete and that housing her in a women's prison was inappropriate.
Prison officials said Greene had been a man known as Ted Greene who was undergoing hormone treatments as part of a sex change and had displayed female characteristics including developed breasts.
Brigano denied that he had known of a potential risk to Greene's safety.
© 2004 The Plain Dealer.
http://www.cleveland.com/search/index.ssf?/base/news/1079524575140060.xml?nohio
John Nolan
Associated Press
Cincinnati - An appeals court on Tuesday revived a lawsuit by a transsexual former Ohio prison inmate who alleged that corrections officials failed to keep her safe from attack.
The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled 2-1 to send the lawsuit by the former prisoner, Traci Greene, back to U.S. District Judge Sandra Beckwith in Cincinnati for reconsideration.
The Ohio attorney general's office is reviewing the decision and has not decided whether to appeal it or proceed to trial, spokeswoman Michelle Gatchell said.
Greene's lawyer, Alphonse Gerhardstein, said he is looking forward to a trial of the lawsuit. Transsexual inmates are vulnerable to attacks by other prisoners, and the state was obliged to keep Greene safe, Gerhardstein said.
"Prison systems have a duty to safely house inmates, and locking Traci Greene with Hiawatha Frezzell was a clear breach of that duty," Gerhardstein said.
Frezzell assaulted Greene several times, according to court testimony, and one of the attacks, in July 1996, was a beating with a mop handle and a 50-pound fire extinguisher.
Two of the three judges ruled that Greene had presented evidence that a jury should consider whether Anthony Brigano, then the warden at Warren Correctional Institution, was indifferent to Greene's safety by placing her in protective custody with a prisoner with a history of assaulting other inmates.
Greene was sent to the Ohio Reformatory for Women in 1993 after being convicted of misuse of credit cards in Toledo, officials said. Greene was transferred three days later to the Warren prison - which houses men - when state administrators concluded that her sex change wasn't complete and that housing her in a women's prison was inappropriate.
Prison officials said Greene had been a man known as Ted Greene who was undergoing hormone treatments as part of a sex change and had displayed female characteristics including developed breasts.
Brigano denied that he had known of a potential risk to Greene's safety.
© 2004 The Plain Dealer.
http://www.cleveland.com/search/index.ssf?/base/news/1079524575140060.xml?nohio