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Elton John and REM frontman Michael Stipe have released a statement condemning reported discrimination against transgender prisoners in the U.S. state of Georgia.
As Rolling Stone reports, transgender inmate Ashley Diamond found her lawsuit against the state of Georgia backed by substantial force when both the U.S. Department of Justice and famed musicians Elton John and Michael Stipe weighed in on the issue. Diamond was repeatedly refused hormone treatment, and she has claimed that the Georgia prison system allowed sexual assault against her to continue.
The musicians wrote in a statement: 'We applaud the U.S. Department of Justice for supporting Ashley Diamond and the trans community in arguing that Georgia's policy of denying transgender inmates their medically necessary hormone treatment is unconstitutional.'
In addition to Ashley Diamond's claims of at least seven rapes committed against her, trans woman Zahara Green accuses one inmate in a seperate lawsuit of multiple rapes, and alleges that after appeal to the department of corrections she was moved to a cell alone with the rapist.
'Transgender women in male prisons have an equal right to protection from violence and abuse in prison, yet they continue to face horrific injustices,' Elton John and Michael Stipe said in a statement. 'This is outrageous, and the message it sends is horrific: that violence against and discrimination of trans people is not only allowed, but sanctioned.'
Both John and Stipe have previously supported a number of major charitable and political causes, including the setting up in 1993 of the Elton John Aids Foundation.
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