Plaintiff is a transgender inmate of a California prison who contends prison officials violated the Eighth Amendment’s through deliberate indifference to her [inmate used to be named Philip but is now known as Mia] serious medical needs. The inmate says she suffers from severe gender dysphoria for which sexual reassignment surgery [SRS] is the medically necessary treatment, but that prison officials refuse to provide the surgery. The trial court dismissed the case for failure to state a cause of action. The Ninth Circuit said “deliberate indifference to the serious medical needs of an inmate is cruel and unusual punishment under the Eighth Amendment.” The appeals court noted the inmate cited repeated episodes of attempted self-castration despite continued hormone treatment. The appeals court reversed, stating plaintiff alleges prison officials recklessly disregarded an excessive risk to her healthy by denying SRS solely on the recommendation of a physician’s assistant with no experience in transgender medicine. (Rosati v. Igbinoso (Ninth Cir.; June 26, 2015) 791 F.3d 1037.) #Mellorlawfirm #lawyer
