Strawberry Hampton is a transgender woman who's currently locked up in Logan Correctional Center in Lincoln, IL. She's been an outspoken advocate for trans women in the criminal (in)justice system for many years and needs our help in order for her legal, civil, and human rights to be upheld.

In 2018, after a years-long legal battle against the Illinois Department of Corrections (IDOC) about the abuses she’d endured from inmates and correctional officers when she'd been placed in a men’s facility, she was transferred to a women’s facility. Her case was the second in US history where a federal court recognized that a prison mis-assigning trans people to the prisons of their birth gender is a form of unlawful discrimination. 

In Logan Correctional Facility, her advocacy for trans rights has made her vulnerable to harassment and abuse. For the last several months, she has been sexually harassed every day by correctional officers, lieutenants, and deputies threatening to rape and sexually assault her and calling her degrading homophobic, transphobic, and racist slurs. 

In fall 2021, she was physically attacked by correctional officers on more than one occasion. Each time, she called the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA) Hotline to report the abuse and threats of rape. In retaliation, COs have issued her multiple tickets on false charges, extending her time in a segregated unit. For months now, she has been able leave her cell for only one hour a day. As a punishment, they have also revoked her programming rights by barring access to mental health, educational, and employment opportunities, pushing back her expected release date by years.

Jean Marie Case, Warden at Logan Correctional Center, has not only been complicit in the attacks by failing to intervene or hold staff accountable, but has refused to hear Strawberry's testimony after she's complained through the facility’s grievance system. 

As individuals who support Strawberry's right to report abuse by correctional staff, her rights guaranteed by the Prison Rape Elimination Act, and her basic human rights, we demand that IDOC and the State of Illinois take action against the abuse, failure to investigate grievances, and retaliation that Strawberry has endured by staff at Logan Correctional Center. 

Strawberry deserves access to education, mental health care, and work experience that will allow her to accrue “good time” in order to be released sooner. It is essential that the officers who have repeatedly threatened her with rape be fired for violating the Prison Rape Elimination Act; that the officers, deputies, and lieutenants be fired for physically assaulting her; and that Warden Case be fired for allowing this to happen with impunity. We believe in the civil and human rights of every transgender and gender non-conforming person both within the criminal justice system and outside, and we will not settle until the people who have allowed this to happen are held to account and Strawberry Hampton is either released or able to have her “good time” reinstated.

This petition will be sent to: Governor J. B. Pritzker; Attorney General Kwame Raoul; Attorney General Bureau Chief Christopher Higgerson; IDOC Director Rob Jeffreys; IDOC Chief of Staff Camile Lindsay; and IDOC Chief Legal Counsel Robert Fanning