Transgender women sue to fight state laws on name changes after convictions

A group of transgender women with criminal records filed suit in federal courts in Illinois and Wisconsin on Wednesday, saying the two states are preventing them from legally adopting their chosen names.

They say they’ve suffered discrimination and abuse by being required to use names on government identification that out them as transgender.

Illinois law prohibits those convicted of felonies and certain misdemeanors from legal name changes for 10 years after their sentences end. Some crimes bar any name changes ever.

The Wisconsin law has similar restrictions, which attorneys for the women called among the most restrictive in the nation.

In the lawsuits, one woman said she was told she couldn’t enroll in a community college unless she used the name on her government identification. Another was denied food stamps. One, Keisha Allen, says that being unable to change the name on her government identification has made it hard to get a job and on two occasions led to physical assaults at work.

The law “makes trans people more vulnerable to discrimination and violence,” Lark Mulligan, a lawyer with the Transformative Justice Law Project, said at a news conference.

Mulligan, who is representing the eight Illinois women along with attorneys from Greenberg Traurig, said the lawsuits raise an issue that hassn’t been decided by any court but is significant. A 2015 survey found that 34 percent of those responding in Illinois and 25 percent of Wisconsin respondents who showed an ID with a name or gender that did not match their gender presentation reported having been harassed, denied benefits or service, asked to leave a place or assaulted.

Eisha Latrice Love, one of the plaintiffs, was denied disability benefits through the Regional Transportation Authority after an employee saw her government-issued identification and discovered she is a transgender woman, according to the lawsuit, which says Love was forced to leave and left unable to receive her benefits that day.

Love, who has been outspoken about trans rights in Chicago, was convicted of aggravated battery in a public place after she was approached by a group of men at a gas station in March 2012 who she said harassed her with anti-trans epithets and physically attacked her. One of the men suffered a leg injury when Love and another woman fled in a car. She was charged after reporting the incident to police.

“I’m trying to move forward with my life, but when I go public places and do public things, I’m constantly reminded of my past,” Love said in a written statement. “Winning this case isn’t just about having my name. It’s like having a piece of me completed.”

A 2017 lawsuit challenged the Illinois law and received the support of then-Attorney General Lisa Madigan. But the plaintiff in that case reached the 10-year bar on name changes while the case was pending, so the lawsuit was ended without a decision.

Attorney General Kwame Raoul’s office didn’t respond Wednesday to requests for comment.

The Wisconsin lawsuit, filed by attorneys Adele Nicholas and Mark Weinberg, involves a lifetime bar that prevents plaintiff Karen Kreby from legally changing her name because of a 1992 conviction that requires her to register as a sex offender. Wisconsin law mandates that anyone on the registry must report all names with which they have been identified. So Kreby says she had to report both her chosen name and her birth name.

The 10-year waiting period in Illinois dates to 1996, coinciding with the creation of Illinois’ sex offender registry. In 2007, the law was amended to include lifetime bars for certain felonies and misdemeanors.

Abigail Blachman reports for Injustice Watch, a nonpartisan, not-for-profit journalism organization that conducts in-depth research to expose institutional failures that obstruct justice and equality.