No Pride in Prisons offers support following serious sexual assault

No Pride in Prisons Ōtepoti this week wishes to offer support to the alleged offender following a serious sexual assault on the 26th of June. The alleged offender has been reported in media as a “man dressed as a woman.”

The offender was described as being Māori or Polynesian, wearing women’s clothing and having long hair. They allegedly sexually assaulted “another man” on the morning of the 26th of June.

No Pride in Prisons Ōtepoti member Scout Barbour-Evans says, “Our organisation is incredibly concerned about potential backlash towards this person from the Dunedin community.”

Barbour-Evans says, “We are also very conscious that transgender people face immense discrimination and violence in the criminal justice system, so we are concerned for the safety of this person.”

“We are reluctant to assume anything about the gender identity or sexuality of this alleged offender, however due to the nature of this sexual assault we are incredibly concerned for their safety in the prison system.”

No Pride in Prisons is a prison abolitionist group based in Auckland, Wellington, and Dunedin. The group has been actively campaigning around the treatment of transgender prisoners in New Zealand, as well as advocating for and supporting several transgender people in New Zealand prisons.

Only last year it was found that a transgender woman had been raped as a result of double bunking in a New Zealand men’s prison. This year, No Pride in Prisons has heard from and supported another transgender inmate who was brutally attacked while in Corrections’ custody.

No Pride in Prisons would like to offer its support to this alleged offender, though the organisation does not condone any acts of sexual violence.

According to Barbour-Evans, “We believe in restorative justice and rehabilitation, and we do not believe the Department of Corrections stands to provide either of these things. Locking away vulnerable people and members of minority groups only puts those people at further risk of harm. Incarceration does not fix societal problems, it only works to exacerbate them.”

ENDS

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