Good News But For A Horrible Reason

A trans woman down in Peru won a human rights case that the local authorities brushed off.

Peru found responsible for rape, torture of transgender woman
The Washington Blade
By Michael K. Lavers
April 14, 2020

The Inter-American Court of Human Rights has issued a landmark ruling that says Peru is responsible for the rape and torture of a transgender woman.

Sadly it was by the local police officers,

Azul Rojas Marín alleges police officers in Casa Grande, a town in the La Libertad region of northern Peru that is roughly 370 miles northwest of the country’s capital of Lima, detained her on Feb. 25, 2008. Rojas says she was forcibly stripped and beaten before two officers sodomized her with a police baton.

Rojas filed a formal complaint against the officers two days after the incident took place.

The court’s ruling — released on March 12, but made public on April 6 — notes local prosecutors launched an investigation into Rojas’ allegations, but they later dropped it. Rojas appealed the decision, but a Peruvian court in January 2009 “dismissed the investigation into the crimes of aggravated sexual assault and abuse of power.”

But almost ten years later…

The ruling orders Peru to “provide medical, psychological and/or psychiatric treatment” to Rojas and to prosecute the officers who tortured her. The ruling also directs Peru to track anti-LGBTQ violence in the country and develop a national strategy to respond to them.
[…]
“The Peruvian state in the entire process before the court, before the commission, all the time has denied the existence of discrimination against LGTB people in Peru,” Oporto [Her lawyer] told the Blade.

“It is absolutely false that there is no discrimination against LGTB,” added Oporto. “The court has recognized that this context persists to this day.”

Oporto said Peru has not responded to the ruling.

“We have not had any communication from them,” Oporto told the Blade.

You have to wonder how many cases go unreported for fear of reprisal from the police and if the Peruvian government will recognize the court's ruling.