Transgender Evacuees
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[News][TX,USA] Transgendered evacuee arrested merylsizemore
Bryan College Station Eagle - TX, United States
http://www.theeagle.com/stories/0909...0050909047.php
Transgendered evacuee arrested
Charged with using women's shower at Reed Arena shelter
By LAURA HENSLEY
Eagle Staff Writer
A 20-year-old transgendered Hurricane Katrina evacuee remained in
the Brazos County Jail on Thursday, five days after being arrested
for showering inside a women's bathroom at Reed Arena.
Arpollo Vicks of New Orleans and her 16-year-old cousin were
arrested Sunday night for criminal trespass after Texas A&M
University Police noticed the two exiting a women's shower facility
at the shelter. The two were born male but live as women and
consider themselves female, Vicks said Thursday in an interview from
the jail.
They are the only people who have been arrested at the local
shelters since the first one opened Aug. 31, shelter officials said.
According to police who were providing security at the Reed Arena
shelter, a woman complained Sunday night that several males were
inside the women's shower facility.
Corps of Cadets Commandant John Van Alstyne, who is in charge of the
shelter, was notified and told police that he earlier had warned
Vicks and the teenager not to shower inside the women's facility.
"I know two males went into the women's rest room," Van Alstyne said
Thursday. "It was something we considered inappropriate."
He declined to comment further.
"They had been warned and basically told not to do that," said Elmer
Schneider, chief of the University Police Department. "Did we want
to arrest them? No. We were almost forced into it because we had
warned them. To me, in this case, it was something of their own
choosing."
Vicks - who said she never was warned not to shower in the women's
bathroom - remained in isolation at the Brazos County Jail on
Thursday evening. She was being held on $6,000 bond for criminal
trespass, a Class B misdemeanor.
Vicks' juvenile cousin since has been released from custody,
returned to Reed Arena and reunited with her 18-year-old sister, who
also is staying there.
"I don't think I should be here," Vicks said during a brief collect
telephone call from the jail. "It's foolish. This is nothing to be
in jail for. I live like this. This is my life.
"Right now, I'm just scared. I've been here since Sunday, and they
haven't told me anything. I've never been in jail before. I'm just
not used to this."
According to Vicks, who said she worked as a substitute teacher at a
middle school in New Orleans, she had never before encountered a
problem when using women's bathrooms. She said she wanted to shower
in the women's facility because she felt safer and more comfortable
doing so.
Vicks said she did not request special accommodations, but that she
did speak to a female volunteer and explained her situation.
Police and shelter officials said they were unaware of any such
conversation.
Ann Robison, executive director of a Houston organization that is
providing support and housing for gay, lesbian, bisexual and
transgendered hurricane evacuees, said special accommodations for
Vicks and her cousin should have been provided by the shelter.
"They should've made provisions for her upfront," Robison said. "She
considers herself female."
Robison said her organization, the Montrose Counseling Center,
doesn't know of any other transgendered hurricane evacuees in
similar situations being arrested at shelters. She said she did help
one transgendered person at a Conroe shelter relocate after
volunteers informed her that the person was being harassed by other
evacuees.
"This makes me real sad," Robison said. "People criminalize gender
identity issues because they are afraid of it or don't understand
it. We understand that people have some fears about it. But it is
just sad, and it angers me."
Contacted Thursday night, Robison said she planned to advise the
Human Rights Campaign, a gay, lesbian and transgendered civil rights
organization in Washington, D.C., that could help Vicks post bail
and provide legal assistance. She also said she would try to link
Vicks and her cousin with safe housing in Houston.
Vicks sounded frustrated Thursday, recounting how she literally had
to swim out of her apartment last week and sleep on an Interstate 10
bridge in New Orleans when the city was flooded by the hurricane.
With no money and no way of reaching family, she said she didn't
know how she was going to get out of jail.
"I'm just living one day at a time and trying to get this over
with," she said. "I've never been through so much in my life."
• Laura Hensley's e-mail address is laura.hensley@theeagle.com.
Merry
TRUE FEMININE = TOTAL WOMAN! 
