CeCe McDonald is a young African American transgender woman facing a “second degree murder” charge after an incident that began when she was violently attacked because of her gender and race.
DROP the charges and FREE CeCe!
Before her life was so unjustly interrupted, CeCe was a creative and energetic student studying fashion at Minneapolis Community and Technical College. She had a stable home where she lived with and helped support four other African American youth, her family. CeCe’s family describes her as a leader, a role model, and a loyal friend. She is also known as a wise, out-spoken and welcoming person. Those closest to CeCe say she has a very cheerful disposition, as well as a history of handling prejudice with amazing grace.
On the morning of June 5th around 12:30, CeCe and four of her friends (all of them black) were on their way to Cub Foods to get some food. As they walked past Schooner’s Bar at 29th St. E. and 27th Ave. S., a man and two women (all of them white) began to yell epithets at them. They called CeCe and her friends faggots, niggers, chicks with dicks, and suggesting that CeCe was dressed as a woman in order to rape the man (whom we know to be Dean Schmitz).
As they were talking, one of the women started taking off her jacket. She smashed her drink into the side of CeCe’s face–lacerating her salivary gland and stinging her eyes with liquor. A fight ensued, with more people joining in. What happened during the fight is unclear, but within a few minutes Dean Schmitz had been stabbed. CeCe was later arrested.
For a month, CeCe was kept in solitary confinement “for her own protection”; she had no say in this matter. Finally, she was transferred to a psychiatric unit in the Public Safety Facility. It was nearly two months before she was taken back to a doctor to check up on the wound on her face, which had turned into a golfball-sized lump.
Later on, CeCe’s friends were harassed on the street by people they recognized from the scene of the fight. Individuals circled the block that CeCe’s friends were walking on and called them niggers and faggots and told them to go back to Africa. When they attempted to wave down a passing squad car for assistance, the officer driving the car said he would not help them.
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(Source: transfeminism, via beaverbunnydelight)
