KOJO NNAMDIYou're tuned in to The Kojo Nnamdi Show on WAMU 88.5. Welcome. Later in the broadcast we'll be talking with Linda Holmes. She's a Pop Culture Correspondent for NPR and the host of the Pop Culture Happy Hour. She's got a debut novel out. It's called "Evvie Drake Starts Over."

KOJO NNAMDIBut first in the last four months the Washington region has had several cases of assault and harassment of members of the LGBTQ community. Many of these incidents have involved transwomen. Prince George's County Police Department is currently investigating the deaths of Zoe Spears and Ashanti Carmon, two trans women who were murdered within three months of each other. Joining us in studio Samantha Schmidt. She's a reporter for the Washington Post covering gender and family issues. Samantha, thank you for joining us.

SAMANTHA SCHMIDTHi. Thanks for having me.

NNAMDIAnd Lieutenant Brett Parson is head of the special liaison branch of the Metropolitan Police Department. Thank you for joining us.

BRETT PARSONThanks, Kojo. Great to be here.

NNAMDISamantha, what do we know about the two cases in Prince George's County? Do we know if the women were targeted, because of their gender?

SCHMIDTSo we don't actually know that yet. We do know that the two women were killed within blocks of each other, that they knew each other, that they were both transgender women of color, and that they were at some points engaged in commercial sex work. And to the transgender community this is to them another symbol of just how often transgender women of color are being killed in this country, something that the American Medical Association has called an epidemic. But according to authorities in Prince George's County, we do not know that they were targeted for their gender identity.

NNAMDIWhat has Prince George's County done to support the trans community in the aftermath of these incidents?

SCHMIDTSo they've been meeting with councilmembers and with advocacy community both in -- primarily in D.C., because that's where kind of the main hub of the LGBT advocacy community is and, you know, they had a vigil on Friday that had a large turnout with both advocates and politicians and members of law enforcement. And they've been working on -- even before this working on developing a new group to focus within Prince George's Police to focus on LGBT issues. And they're definitely working on speaking with the women near Eastern Avenue where a lot of the commercial sex work has been taking place.

NNAMDIEarline Budd now has joined us by phone. As I said, she's an advocate for the organization Empowering The Transgender community. Earline Budd, thank you for joining us.

EARLINE BUDDThank you, Kojo.

NNAMDIWhat was your relationship Earline to the two victims in Prince George's County?

BUDDWell, you know, I work as a non-medical case major here at Hips on HD Northeast, but both ladies were not actually clients on my case load. They were individuals who frequented Hips because they had other friends here and this is a safe space for LGBT folks including transgender. So that's how I encountered them and I've had, you know, a very long -- a few years at least. Ashanti was about two year relationship with me and Zoe, of course, was five years, I did work with her to help her get her first unit, which was on Eastern Avenue not far from where she was murdered.

NNAMDILast Friday there were two vigils held for the victims. What was the idea behind those vigils and what did you hear from community members who attended?

BUDDWell, the vigil at 5:30, which was at Fremont Heights at the scene where Zoe Spears was murdered was held post. On Thursday we had a very large turnout here at Hip where we had city officials, police departments from both jurisdictions, transgender, and other LGBT allies. And it was just powerful in terms of we were able to sit down to agree and disagree and come up with some really good suggestions in terms of moving forward such as training and cross training with police in PG County, also trying to talk about how to develop more resources in PG County, so that so many trans will not have to come across the line to D.C. for all their services.

BUDDAnd the second vigil at Dupont Circle was purely to bring attention to the violence, but more so to also ask on the government to put more money into services for LGBT folks specifically the transgender community, which in D.C. currently does not have any real housing money or any housing programs for that population. And most trans women that are homeless have to find themselves unfortunately in the shelters. And in most cases their more comfortable in the male shelters.

NNAMDIWe're talking about recent cases of violence against members of the trans community. We mentioned Lieutenant Brett Parson, head of the special liaison branch of the Metropolitan Police Department joins us in studio. The cases in Prince George's County are not the only incidents of violence against trans people in the area. What can you tell us about the recent bias related cases here in the District?

PARSONWell, thanks, Kojo. It's great to be here. You know, we in the Metropolitan Police Department have a long history working in the LGBTQ plus community. Our then Gay and Lesbian liaison unit, which started in the late 80s -- or I'm sorry, in the late 90s continues now as the LGBT liaison unit. The cases that have come to light in the media and on social media lately are unfortunate in that they continue to show not necessarily a pattern that the Metropolitan Police Department can say that a particular area or a particular type of person is being targeted, but that these types of motives where people are motivated by their hatred, bias, and prejudice continue to perpetrate crimes against people and they come out while they're perpetrating crimes.

PARSONAnd that's disturbing, you know. Whether or not we're able to prove that there's evidence of bias in a court of law or through prosecution is really irrelevant. We understand that we need to pursue that avenue if it exists. But really we're talking about individuals in a community that feel they're being targeted. And whether we can prove that or not we need to make sure that we're visible, that we're building strong relationships with them, and that we're most important doing what Earline talked about on Thursday and Friday, listening, listening to their concerns, listening to their suggestions and where we can, trying to accommodate the needs that they have.

NNAMDIYou mentioned the special liaison unit within the police department focused on LGBTQ issues. Can you tell us a little bit more about the idea behind that unit that was founded in the 1990s?

PARSONWell, the idea behind the special liaison branch is looking at law enforcement the way we deploy our members and the way we execute our mission a little bit differently than traditional policing. Most police officers have a beat. They have a geographic border and they're responsible for walking that beat, riding in that beat, or being visible in that beat. In the special liaison branch we take a different way to look at that. We look at demographics and so we focus on different communities that are traditionally underserved or maybe targeted for bias and hatred and we focus our efforts and our mission in that area. We're in the Asian, Latino, deaf and hard of hearing, LGBTQ plus, also in the Jewish, Muslim, and African communities.

PARSONAnd the three parts of our mission are very simple. We're doing outreach. So we're building relationships, creating relationships with individuals who have traditionally either had trouble building relationships with the police or have a difficult relationship with police. Secondly, we're doing training and education not only of our police officers about these communities, their cultures and their needs, but also educating community members about their rights and what they can expect of law enforcement. And then finally the part that's relevant to today is we are actually working hand and hand with our law enforcement partners responding to acts of violence, crimes and incidents within the communities we serve to hopefully bring justice and to bring more calm and safety to those communities.

NNAMDISamantha Schmidt, in a recent article for the Post you wrote about some cross jurisdictional challenges between Prince George's and the District. Prince George's does not have a special liaison unit like the District does. In addition, the District has an array of other services available to transgender men and women. What's the upshot of that?

SCHMIDTYeah. So especially in the case of these two deaths, they happened so close to the D.C. line and they actually happened to two D.C. residents, women who were members of our community. So it made a lot of sense that the D.C. advocates were stepping in, you know, to plan the vigils and to respond to this. But I think this kind of just also sheds light on how few resources like that exist in Prince George's County. You know, in D.C. we have resources like Women Walk or we have Casa Ruby. We have, you know, from healthcare to housing to employment support. There's so much available to the LGBT community.

SCHMIDTAnd D.C. is really a leader in the country on that. It has a mayor's office for LGBT affairs, which is still a pretty rare unit in jurisdictions across the country. And so, you know, Prince George's is lagging behind in that way as are many other counties in the DMV area. And so I think in times like this it's up to the D.C. advocacy groups and, you know, resources like Casa Ruby and Hips, you know, to step in and help in these situations.

NNAMDIEarline Budd, what kind of relationship or success have you had dealing with officials in Prince George's County?

BUDDWell, this is actually my first time and I think it drew attention with them based on the two murders. And I think that the conversation that we had is very positive and I actually received a call from the Prince George's County Health Department. And, I mean, they were just emphatically straight forward that we need your assistance and other trans intermediators that are doing this work to sit down and discuss how to do resources, groups with transgender women that are in PG County and Maryland and also how to develop programs and strategies for them. So I was very happy to get that call. But then also the larger meeting drew upon just more positive stuff in terms of talking about what, you know, the dollars that may be needed for these projects as well.

BUDDSo, I mean, I'm optimistic that moving forward with this relationship that we here at Hips and myself will be able to join in and help PG County to get where it needs to get in terms of having programs, developing rather programs and having services in PG County as does D.C.

NNAMDIBrett Parson, as we said the last two years have marketed an uptake in hate crimes in the Washington region targeted at member of the LGBTQ community. What makes something a hate crime?

PARSONThat's a great question. The first part of that is you need to understand for it to be a bias related crime or colloquially we refer to them as hate crimes. There has to be an underlying crime. So we're talking about things like assault, destruction of property, threats, things like that. Once you get to the point where you have the elements or the particular actions that make up a crime, then we get into motive and that's what a bias enhancement is.

PARSONIt is not a crime in it of itself. It is saying that there is potential or there is reason to believe that the person or persons that committed that crime were motivated either wholly or partially by their hatred towards the victim or victims, because of their actual or perceived part of one of our classified protected groups. And we have well over 20 of those in the District of Columbia to include sexual orientation, gender identity, and gender expression also appearance, which is important in this discussion as well.

NNAMDIWell, how do you approach a crime if you believe it was motivated by hate and how do you go about proving that?

PARSONIt's not easy. People will be probably hardened to know that the police don't read your minds and you don't want us to. So proving someone's motive has to be done by looking at not only their actions, but also delving deeper into the surrounding activity of the offense. So things like what was going on before the offense occurred. If we're talking about a crime committed against a gay couple, were they holding hands? Were they kissing? Were they participating in an event that was clearly an LGBTQ event in the public? What was said? What was the language used? Is there a history with this individual of perhaps incidents reports where they have used homophobic or transphobic language?

PARSONAnd then we can also if we're digging into more serious crimes, you know, execute search warrants, look at, you know, computer activity to see if maybe they're going into chat rooms in groups that may indicate that they have some sort of sustained activity of hatred, bias, and prejudice. We don't see a lot of those. Those are kind of serial hate crime offenses. Most of our hate crime offenses are really one time offenses where people, their deep seeded inhibitions come out and those prejudices come out and unfortunately while they're committing crimes.

NNAMDIEarline, what do you believe is behind the increase in reports of violence? Earline Rudd, are you there? Earline Budd, I'm sorry.

BUDDWhat was your question? My apology.

NNAMDIEarline, what do you believe is behind the increase in reports of violence?

BUDDYou know, I don't think that, Kojo, there is ever a real reason. I just think that there's just some people that just in their heart have hatred and just, you know, come out. I believe they're people that leave their houses daily and decide that they're going to go out and assault somebody. In the incident case of Ashanti and like Zoe Spears, I don't clearly know what, you know, the motive is behind it. But personally as I said to the detectives, I said publicly I do believe that both of these murders are related. And that, you know, Ashanti's murder, of course, happened on March the 30th and then Zoe's happened on June 13th. And Zoe had made some points that indicated that possibly she may have known or witnessed the murder of her girlfriend.

NNAMDIAny idea at all, Samantha Schmidt, about why?

SCHMIDTWhy they were killed? The police at this point aren't able to give much information, but they do say that they believe it had potentially to do with their work in the sex industry. And that's still, you know, in the early stages of investigation and they're still, you know, don't have any other evidence.

NNAMDILieutenant Brett Parson.

PARSONKojo, if I could. I can't comment on the investigations going on PG County. But to comment more broadly whether or not Ashanti and Zoe were targeted, because of their gender identity, gender expression is really from a criminal aspect irrelevant to us as police officers. We're investigating the crimes of murder. And what's more important to realize is that we have an entire community of individuals in the transgender community, who feel as if they're being targeted, and again, whether or not we can prove that in a court of law, whether we can charge it, we need to understand that that fear exists that that anxiety is there.

PARSONAnd trying to wrap our hands around why it is happening, I think we sometimes get so frustrated that we lose track of these are underlying crimes of horrible violence and individuals, who suffer great forms of violence in our society are crying out and saying, hey, we feel targeted.

NNAMDIEarline Budd, last week the rainbow caucus of the LGBTQ advisory neighborhood commissioner sent a letter to D.C. Council's Chairman, Phil Mendelson, calling for increased funding for agencies that support the LGBTQ community. We just talked about the District as doing pretty well when it comes to support for the LGBTQ community. But I got to tell you, the fact that we have not received any phone calls in this broadcast at all on this issue suggests to me that there is a lack of broader community support for this community. By the way if you're interested in joining the conversation the number is 800-433-8850 if you care. Earline, but is there more to be done? And where would you say the funding is needed most?

BUDDYeah, there is definitely more to be done. But as I said, on Friday, I said at the vigils, you know, I'm a 60 year old transgender woman born and raised here in the District of Columbia. And what I can tell you is that coming from the early 70s and 80s during the AIDS epidemic and all of the things that were going on, there were no programs like this. So emphatically we've come a very long way here in the District of Columbia, especially having a gay liaison unit of officers and across the city now and a lot of programs and services. But still, yeah, we lack in terms of having the true funding that we need to have housing, to figure out how to resolve some employment issues.

BUDDAnd, you know, I often hear and I've heard on this broadcast today, the word prostitution, sex work. Ruby Corado, I think says it best in a mildly way of calling it simply survival work. And that's exactly what it is. A lot of these women that are doing this are not prostituting. They're just trying to survive. And I, as a transgender woman, know it all too well, because I too was in the same at an early age pushed out by my family. And I had to survive so I experienced sex work. And so, yeah, there's a lot to be done bottom line. There's more funding needed.

BUDDAnd I trust and hope that based on what happened on Friday, the LGBT caucus group that got up there and they made a big speech and they challenged the City Council where the Chair Councilmember Phil Mendelson was present at the vigil on Dupont Circle, I know that they're probably sitting back having some discussions, trying to figure out maybe if not the whole five million, but how much can they allocate so that we can have housing and have more programs here in the District of Columbia, specifically when we start talking about the transgender population.

NNAMDIGot to take a short break, when we come back we'll continue this community, the trans community's calling for support in the wake of violent attacks. I'm Kojo Nnamdi.

NNAMDIWelcome back. We're talking about an uptake in violence against members of the LGBTQ community. We're talking with Lieutenant Brett Parson. He's head of the special liaison branch of the Metropolitan Police Department. Samantha Schmidt is a Reporter for the Washington Post covering gender and family issues. And Earline Budd is an Advocate for the organization Empowering The Transgender Community. Here's Rachel in Washington D.C. Rachel, you're on the air. Go ahead, please.

RACHELYes, hi. I'm a long time listener, a first time caller. And I was just very moved, Kojo, when you just said, "if anybody cares." I'm an ally in the community and it touched my heart just the way you put that. I want to express my support. I'm mortified to hear about these things and I would hate for anybody in my community to feel that we don't care, we don't support. You know, just like radio silence or a vacuum out there. And I remember back in the day when I was out and about more in the community, I remember Brett Parson and, you know, him being around and people feeling more reassured about having that part of the police dedicated to issues within their community. So anyway, yeah, I was just really moved and I just wanted to express my support.

NNAMDIThank you very much for calling and as you can see Brett Parson is still very much around. Earline Budd, last week you were involved in a community meeting with D.C. public officials. What happened at that meeting?

BUDDAgain, we had Ruby Corado, myself, (unintelligible) and other trans and activists at the meeting. And the purpose of the meeting was to have a discussion on collaborating efforts between PG County and the District of Columbia and talk about resources. And, again, at the end of the meeting we came out with some basic things we wanted to do specifically talking about cross training, allowing myself, Ms. Corado and other trans women to be involved in PG County's training with their police officers and then also some resources in terms of talking about holding some groups in PG County and also helping other women that are in PG County to be self-sufficient. And also to come forward and maybe to help build resources and office spaces and do the things that we're doing in the District in PG County.

NNAMDIOkay. Thank you. On to Michael in Washington D.C. on the phone. Michael, you're on the air, go ahead, please.

MICHAELHi, Kojo. Thank you. And I just want to say I am a volunteer with Hip. So thank you, Ms. Budd for your incredible work that you've been doing in the D.C. community. My question is, I think there's a lot of different organizations and I'm glad to see a lot of different organizations working on issues especially as it comes to safety of marginalized populations, trans women especially. But it seems that sometimes they're conflicting with each other. It's a policing issue and a public health issue and a legal rights, immigrant rights issue. You know, how do we -- where do you see the intersections lie? Kind of how do we solve this issue holistically, these problems holistically?

NNAMDIWell, the issue of solving the problem holistically is one of the challenges that faces an administration like the mayor and the D.C. Council or the administrations in Prince George's County and other jurisdictions. What we are looking at here are the criminal aspects of this and what needs to be done about them, because as Lieutenant Brett Parson has pointed out first the crime has to be committed. And then we have to establish that it was a hate crime. So that's the aspect of it that we're dealing with right now.

NNAMDIThe larger social issues I guess is a subject for another conversation. But, Brett Parson, the special liaison unit used to send out violence prevention and response team emails to leaders of the LGBT community making people aware of any violence or activity that was taking place in that community. Apparently that line of communication was halted. Has it been reinstituted?

PARSONWell, thanks for letting me clarify that, Kojo. So first of all, yes. We are restarting what we call our VPR alerts starting July the first. We have also given the updates for the month of June to that group so that they are aware of what's occurred in June. Normally they get an end of the month report. But what's important to know is that the communication with the members of VPR committee and the VPR group never stopped. We were actually always in contact with them. It was that one form of communication by way of a list serve that we had stopped doing that temporarily so that it could be reevaluated and that we could remove members who were no longer part of the group and put new members on. But the communication had been going on during that time through individuals. So when a crime occurred in a particular area of the LGBT community, a community leader or other leaders in that community would be notified.

NNAMDIEarline Budd, you mentioned earlier both of the victims in the Prince George's County cases were engaged in commercial sex work. What can pubic officials do to help and protect and support those workers especially since the work is still illegal?

BUDDWell, I'm on the opposite side of that and I've never been one to say that Ashanti or Zoe were involved in commercial sex work. I mean, if it's the case survival work as Ruby Corado has said then for me I clearly understand it, because I'm someone that has had to go through that in life. But I think that we talked about one of the things that probably trying to figure out how to have a town hall with these women that are frequenting the Eastern Avenue area.

BUDDAnd let me just say that for the record, excuse me. Everyone that is on Eastern Avenue is out there are not prostituting or as they call it commercial sex work. A lot of folks -- we have no places in the District anymore for LGBTQ folks to go to clubwise. We had Baxter's Mill was the last location. So I have learned that many transgender women and LGBTQ folks, they find different areas to frequent and Eastern Avenue is actually one of those places, while people think it's only just commercial sex work that's going on in that area.

BUDDBut we have to have a town hall, talk with them and hear from them what they feel -- what kind of services they want. And also at the end of the day to make sure those that really want the service can get it, because what I said publically is that at the end of the day there is some people who are just comfortable with doing commercial sex work. But there's also people that want a better way of life and are not wanting to be involved in commercial sex work. So we have to figure out -- do conversation town halls, and then start, you know, talking about what resources need to be put in place for that. Thank you.

NNAMDIRunning out of time quickly, Earline Budd, but D.C. Councilmember, David Grosso, has again proposed decriminalizing sex work. Do you think that would help to reduce violence against sex workers?

BUDDYes. Yeah. I think it does. I mean, I've not been one of the women that's been in the forefront of decriminalization. We have other women here who are part of SWAK and those groups. But yes, I do believe that decriminalization is something that may in fact cut down on some of the crimes related to our population.

NNAMDIOkay. Just I want to get one comment in from Gabriel in Maryland who identifies himself as a District 39 Maryland State Delegate. Gabriel, you're on the air. Go ahead, please.

GABRIELThanks, Kojo. I just wanted to just offer up as well as highlight the work that is being done in Prince George's County considering that the death of these two trans women of color took place there. I as well as Councilmember Joline Ivy, who represents that district and officials from Fairmont Heights and the Marsha P. Johnson Institute led by my friend, (unintelligible) and the Black Futurist group met to not only discuss the work that we need to do in terms of resources and building that infrastructure in Prince George's County, which I think there's momentum for, but also the policy changes that we need to make to ensure that trans women of color are not just dying at these very alarming rates, but we're providing opportunities for them outside of what was just offered such as survival work, right? We know that they have such great potential, but oftentimes we force people to particular work or economy.

NNAMDIYou've got about 30 seconds left.

GABRIELSo the LGBTQ dignity project Councilmember Joline Ivy, that work is being done.

NNAMDIOkay.

MICHAELWe would offer that. You know, we allow those folks to be a part of the conversation and to rebuild that kind of community and just society that we're seeking.

NNAMDIOkay. Gabriel, thank you so much for your call. I'm afraid that's all the time we had. So Earline Budd, thank you for joining us.

BUDDThank you so very much, Kojo.

NNAMDISamantha Schmidt, thank you for joining us.

SCHMIDTThank you.

NNAMDIAnd, Lieutenant Brett Parson, thank you for joining us.

PARSONIt's been an honor. Thank you.

NNAMDIWe're going to take a short break. When we come back we'll talk with Linda Holmes about her debut novel. It's called, "Evvie Drake Starts Over." I'm Kojo Nnamdi.