US

Transgender Inmate Settles With Minnesota Department Of Corrections, Will Transfer To Women’s Facility, Get Surgery

This photo does not depict any of the correctional facilities involved in the story. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

Brent Foster Contributor
Font Size:

A transgender woman who settled with the Minnesota Department of Corrections (DOC) is set to transfer to a woman’s facility and receive a vaginoplasty surgery, Fox News reported Sunday.

Christina Lusk, who was arrested in 2018 and set to remain incarcerated until 2024 on a felony drug offense, was previously refused a genital surgery by DOC medical director James Amsterdam, according to FOX News.

Lusk later sued the Minnesota DOC with representation from legal nonprofit Gender Justice, according to FOX 9. (RELATED: Transgender Inmate Gets 7 More Years After Raping Woman In Jail)

Gender Justice legal director Jess Braverman said other inmates “would heckle her, heckle her roommates … call her ‘it,'” the outlet reported.

Braverman said staff members told Lusk “you’re a man in a men’s prison. I’m not going to treat you like a woman. I’m not going to use your proper name and pronouns,” FOX 9 reported.

The Minnesota DOC in a press release confirmed Lusk will be moved to Minnesota Correctional Facility (MCF) Shakopee, a women’s facility. She is currently housed in MCF Moose Lake.

“The DOC is constitutionally obligated to provide medically necessary care for incarcerated people, which includes treatment for gender dysphoria,” Minnesota DOC Commissioner Paul Schnell said in the release.

By scheduling Lusk’s transfer, Minnesota “joins ten (10) other states and the District of Columbia” in the approval of “transfers to facilities matching an incarcerated person’s gender identity rather than their gender assigned at birth,” the release continued.

The Minnesota DOC additionally agreed to pay Lusk a total of $495,000, according to FOX 9.