Paris Lee, a Black transgender woman in Memphis, was shot six times in her home. In May 2025, a Shelby County jury rejected the shooter’s self-defense claim and convicted him of voluntary manslaughter. The medical examiner’s findings didn’t line up with his story, he had no injuries, and he drove about half an hour to his own house before calling 911.

Now that conviction has been thrown out. The Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals ruled that the jury should have been told Paris was transgender, and ordered a new trial where the defense can use her gender identity to support his self-defense argument. According to independent journalist Jamie Satterfield, who first reported the story, no Tennessee court has ruled this way before.

Advocates call this the “panic” defense: the idea that a victim’s gender identity or sexual orientation makes them more threatening, or makes violence against them easier to excuse. Twenty states have banned it. Tennessee is not one of them.

Self-defense should rest on facts: what happened, who was armed, and what the evidence shows. “A deadly weapon is a deadly weapon is a deadly weapon,” the trial judge said, according to Erin in the Morning. A gun is no more or less dangerous because of who is holding it. Every victim deserves equal protection under the law, and every jury deserves to weigh evidence, not stereotypes.

Tennessee lawmakers can close this gap. The Tennessee General Assembly should pass a law that bars defendants from using a victim’s actual or perceived gender identity or sexual orientation to justify violence or reduce their responsibility for it. Governor Bill Lee should sign it.

Sign the petition to ban the panic defense in Tennessee before another case turns on who the victim was instead of what really happened.