(UndercoverDC) The nation’s prison system is over capacity and upside down. Talk to anyone who has spent time in federal prison, and they will tell you it is dysfunctional on so many levels, including that every prison that houses women in the country has transgender individuals living and sharing intimate spaces with biological women. Advocates for transgender females will tell you that there is no danger to biological women. However, reports from a group of women in SFF Hazelton—a women’s prison in W. Virginia—tell a different story.
The Biden administration restored Obama’s policies on transgender individuals in the nation’s federal prisons in early 2022. Biden’s Justice Department began reviewing transgender prison policies in early 2021. Trump reversed some of the guidelines in 2018, encouraging decisions about placement on a “case-by-case” and not solely based on gender identity. However, the Bureau of Prisons (BOP) reissued the Obama-era Transgender Offender Manual in January 2022.
I was reminded of this policy shift because I regularly correspond with J6 defendants now in federal women’s prisons. A group of women now write to me regularly from SFF Hazelton—two are J6ers. In the cases where I have not been explicitly given permission to include their names, I have redacted their identities.
All of the female correspondents report in their letters that transgender females have raped and sexually harassed vulnerable females in the facility. According to their reports, some transgender females allegedly live in the same cells as biological women.
According to BOP statistics, as of June 27, 2024, there are 158,778 Federal inmates in BOP Custody. Zero are housed in privately managed facilities, and 14,076 are housed in “other types of facilities.” As of 2022, six of the 27 facilities that hold women hold women exclusively, and 21 are co-ed.
Inmate gender statistics show that females comprise 6.8% of inmates in federal custody—10,601 females. Males constitute 93.2%—145,836 males in total. According to BOP, currently, “There are 1,424 transgender females (biological males) and 765 transgender males in BOP custody.” That means transgender individuals make up roughly 13.4% of the individuals housed in women’s prisons. At the end of 2022, “About 1 in 48 adult U.S. residents (2%) was under some form of correctional supervision,” an estimated 5,407,300 persons.
SFF Hazelton Inmate Correspondence: Transgender Females Raping or Sexually Abusing Women
I received a packet of letters from 10 women currently incarcerated at SFF Hazelton. Either collaboratively or individually, the women shared their perspectives on the hardships of prison. Many of their concerns focused on transgender individuals in the facility. However, they also spoke about allegations of severely deficient medical care for serious illnesses like cancer, the use of illegal drugs to treat women, retaliation for not obeying rules by staff, insufficient nutrition or time to eat a meal, and substandard conditions overall at Hazelton.
FCI Hazelton is a co-ed medium-security prison with a low-security Secure Female Facility (SFF) that shares the same property location. Inmates at low-security prisons are afforded privileges that those incarcerated in medium—to high-security prisons are not. However, according to some of the letters, low-security guidelines are being disregarded.
One of the inmates, Lisa Biron, has been in the prison system for 12 years, serving a 40-year sentence “on a wrongful conviction.” One of Biron’s complaints, confirmed by a couple of the others, is that SFF Hazelton requires them to leave their mail unsealed, a privilege reportedly allowed to individuals incarcerated at low-security prisons. In her correspondence, Biron reports Hazelton “heightens security, in violation of policy, as if they were running a men’s higher security prison.”
Biron requested her letter be sent to several politicians so that they could investigate the facility. The letter was addressed to W. Virginia U.S. Attorney Ihlenfeld, Rep. Alexander Mooney (R-WV), Rep. Carol Miller (R-WV), Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-SC), Sen.Joe Manchin (I-WV), and Sen. Shelley Capito (R-WV).
Biron, formerly a licensed attorney, was previously incarcerated in three other low-security female facilities: FCI Danbury, FMC Carswell, and FCI Waseca. Biron wrote that while “there were, of course, deficiencies at each of my former facilities,” SFF Hazelton is the most “dysfunctional” of all—“truly a rogue female facility.”
Women at Hazelton Worry for Their Safety While Sharing Spaces with Transgender Females
The letters contain many examples of poor treatment and alleged failures to follow BOP guidelines. However, the most troubling of the complaints pertains to transgender females (biological males) who are being placed in their facility. In some cases, they are allegedly in the same cells as women or sharing shower facilities, according to the letters.
Deference to gender identity and not biological sex as a criterion for placement is causing significant issues for the women housed at SFF Hazelton. All of the women described instances of rape, sexual harassment, and beatings, none of which have been adequately addressed by the staff.
In the letter below, the author shares her fears about a fellow J6 defendant not getting the cancer treatments she needs. However, the most alarming part is her mention of women being in danger when “housed with biological males. I can tell you horror stories,” she continued. “One woman was recently put in the SHU after experiencing abuse from a male. Another man was shipped off the compound after having sex with multiple women, seven who filed complaints…”
One of the other women wrote the following:
