P.D.I.D. | Criminal Podcast | Forensic Files

Phoebe Judge: This episode contains language that may not be suitable for everyone.
Patti Hammond Shaw: I was sitting on a sofa watching Oprah and I had fixed me some Long
Island iced tea, watching Oprah. And he was sitting in the chair across from me.
And next thing I know, he gets up and come and sit beside me. And I said, "Something ain't right with this.
There's something that's about to happen." Phoebe Judge: In December 2009, Patti Shaw was watching TV with her cousin's friend.
A man who said his name was Anthony. Anthony was much younger than Patti. She was in her mid-40s and he was in his early 20s.
She didn't know him that well, but her cousin had vouched for him, suggesting that Anthony
rent the spare bedroom in Patti's apartment. So far, he'd only spent one night there.
Patti Hammond Shaw: I wanted him to look at me like a mother figure or like a aunt.
No, that didn't happen. He kept looking at me a certain way, but I didn't want to believe that he was liking
me like that. Phoebe Judge: Patti says Anthony put his hand on her leg. Patti Hammond Shaw: And I said, "I know he's not touching me."
Oprah was saying something that was important, and I turned around slowly and gave him a
look like, "Don't do that." Phoebe Judge: Patti had collected a lot of decorative plaster statues.
They were all around her apartment. One of them was in the shape of a lion. Patti Hammond Shaw: He took the lion that was sitting on that column and hit me across
my head right here. You see this little dent? He hit me, bust me in my head. It immediately swelled up to the size of an apple.
Phoebe Judge: She picked up another one of her statues and threw it at Anthony. They started to fight, and Patti says she ran into the street and flagged down a police
car. Patti Hammond Shaw: And I said, "Officer, officer, I'm being assaulted in my house."
Now at this point I had blood dripping, my tooth was knocked out, my eye was swollen.
And when the policeman came, he said, "Who is the president of the United States?"
I said, "You asking me, who is the president of the United States. I've just been bust in my head with a statue, my eye is black, my tooth is gone out of my
mouth. And you asking me, who is the president of the United States?" And he said to me, "Well, answer the question."
And I said, "Barack Obama." And then he said, "Well, I'm going to have to put you under arrest."
I said, "Under arrest? For what?" Phoebe Judge: The officer told Patti that she was being arrested because they believed
that she was the one who assaulted Anthony. They also said Anthony was underage, which turned out not to be true.
Patti Hammond Shaw: And so he said, "Put your hands behind your back." I said, "No, I'm not."
He said, "Yes, you are. And don't resist." I said, "OK, not a problem." I said, "Let me get my keys and let me set my alarm and lock my doors."
And he said, "No, we'll take care of all that." So they take me outside and put me in one police car.
And he said, "We have to take you to the hospital because this doesn't look good.
Your face looks terrible." And I said, "OK, not a problem." Phoebe Judge: They took her to a hospital in Southeast D.C.
And handcuffed her to the bed. Patti had been to that hospital before, she was already in their computer system.
Patti Hammond Shaw: I was registered under Patti Hammond Shaw. And they gave me a armband that said Patti Hammond Shaw.
Phoebe Judge: But when the officers fingerprinted her, a different name came up, and things
got a lot more complicated. Patti Hammond Shaw: After leaving the hospital, I'm transported to, I think it was Sixth District.
Sixth District gives me an armband saying my birth name, sex: male. And I said, "That's not who I am."
I said, "Look at this. This is who I am." And they said, "No, with your fingerprints and everything, it came back to, this is who
you are. And so we got to go on the fingerprints. And we're going to have to put you in a cell with the men."
I said, "No, you're not going to put me in the cell with the men." Phoebe Judge: For today's story, guest contributor Lauren Ober spent time with Patti and her
lawyer, and takes us behind the scenes of what happens when the police decide your gender
for you. I'm Phoebe Judge. This is Criminal. Patti Hammond Shaw: Are you recording?
Lauren Ober: I am. Patti Hammond Shaw: You should have said we're starting. Lauren Ober: We're starting.
[Laughter.] Red light means we're on. We're on. Patti Hammond Shaw: OK. Lauren Ober: I visited Patti at her apartment in Southwest D.C.
It's tidy and well-appointed with a balcony that offers some pretty great views of the
city. Patti's two dogs, Crushio and Toya, did not appreciate having a visitor. So Patti banished them to the bedroom.
I started our chat by asking Patti to describe herself. Patti Hammond Shaw: I'm 5'7", thick, very attractive, full lips.
Had my eyebrows pulled to make my eyes slanty. I have permanent makeup. I have large breasts, large behind, small waist, like Betty Boop.
Like Jill Scott, and Chaka Khan, a combo of those two. A very strong woman, very independent, very cautious of who I allow in my circle.
Lauren Ober: Patti figured out her gender identity pretty early on in life. Patti Hammond Shaw: Growing up as a child, I had already knew that I was transgender.
Well, wanted to be transgender. My mom used to only buy me doll babies. She would never buy me like a GI Joe or a truck, because I wouldn't play with it.
I would break it up and throw it in the trash. So she know to buy me feminine things, like jump rope, et cetera.
And I had one doll baby. And I sucked a pacifier till I was 4. Lauren Ober: Patti says her mother kind of liked that her male child had some feminine
characteristics. It was endearing. Her father, who was mostly out of the picture, did not.
On the rare occasions when he would come around, he'd tell Patti's mother that she was raising
a sissy. As she got older, Patti began to take steps to change her appearance. When you started having surgery, did you have a vision of a person that you wanted to be?
Patti Hammond Shaw: I did. I always admired Chaka Khan. I always admired Phyllis Hyman, because Phyllis Hyman was a tall woman, but she was very confident
with her size. And I said, "OK, they're full-figured, but they're very confident and very sexy."
I said, "OK, I can do it." And I've been happy with my decision, ever since. Lauren Ober: Patti had gender reassignment surgery on December 14th, 1993, and went through
the process of legally changing her gender. She had her birth certificate amended, as well as the name and sex on her driver's license.
In the eyes of the law, she was female. And yet when the D.C. Police ran her fingerprints, she came up as male.
She was already in their system because in 1984, Patti was arrested for sodomy, which
was illegal in D.C. until 1993. The D.C. Police gave her a Police Department Identification Number, also known as P.D.I.D.
And according to that number, her gender was male, the gender she was assigned at birth.
So it didn't matter what she said or what her driver's license said. The police didn't believe her.
Jeffrey Light: What often happens is that when that violence is reported to the police,
the police see transgender individuals as being untrustworthy. Lauren Ober: Patti's lawyer, Jeffrey Light.
Jeffrey Light: There's some interesting societal factors that go into that. One of them is thinking that transgender people are somehow misrepresenting themselves.
They really are a man, but they're saying a woman, and so they're untrustworthy.
Other times, the issue is that somebody says their name, when they're asked by the police,
but their ID gives a different name. And law enforcement might think that the person is lying about their name or trying to hide
something, when in fact the person's just giving the name that they're called. Lauren Ober: This is what happened to Patti.
She kept trying to explain that they were making a mistake and that she should not be
detained with men, but no one listened. In lockup, she was strip searched — in front of male detainees.
Patti Hammond Shaw: It was about 10 of us lined up against the wall. And they made me take off my clothes.
They made me be the first one, and the rest of the guys was in another part of the cell.
And then they're searching between my legs, told me, open my legs, lift up my balls and
my penis. I said, "I don't have them." And he said, "That's what you all say, turn around, put your hand up against the wall."
They search under my breasts. He felt between my legs. But if you felt between my legs, then you should know that it was a vagina and not a
penis. Lauren Ober: After they processed her, they sent her to the male side of D.C.'s Central
Cell Block to await arraignment. There, she says, things got worse. Patti Hammond Shaw: All night, early in the morning, I'm just constantly being assaulted
by the guys, asking to see my vagina and asking to see my breasts. And they standing up at the bars and saying, if I didn't show him then when we get in the
bullpen, they was going to beat my head to the white meat. Lauren Ober: After that Patti was moved to a pre-trial holding area, run by the U.S.
Marshals, and again, she was forced to be in the men's cellblock. But here, it wasn't just the other detainees who were causing problems.
Patti Hammond Shaw: When you first come through the U.S. Marshals, they're making jokes and
making fun. And they just belittle you, they make fun of you like you're a joke.
No, I'm a human being and I have rights. Lauren Ober: Finally, her case was called.
She was charged with assaulting Anthony, the younger guy from the apartment, but Anthony
didn't show up for court. The prosecutors couldn't find him, so the case against her was dismissed.
But Patti knew that the way she'd been treated was wrong, and she hired a lawyer to prove
it. Patti Hammond Shaw: And I said, "Now you will believe me, because now at this point my voice
is going to get louder and I'm getting ready to make some noise." Lauren Ober: What's interesting is that on paper, regulations had already been put into
place that should have allowed Patti to be held in a cell with other women, regardless
of what the computer said. Jeffrey Light: D.C. regulations were fairly clear that individuals who are transgender
should be treated as their gender identity and expression. But at the same time, other regulations said that men and women are to be kept out of sight
and sound of each other in order to avoid potential safety issues, harassment, and that
sort of thing. So the D.C. government and the U.S. Marshal service took that position that they didn't
know that Patti Shaw was a female, and therefore they were entitled to put her wherever they
thought was appropriate. Lauren Ober: My question is, do they look at IDs? I mean, her ID says that she is female, her driver's license says she's female.
She has a female name. She presents this female. And, although this is irrelevant, she has had a gender reassignment surgery.
So how did they not know she was female? Jeffrey Light: One of the really interesting things we learned during this case, is how
the D.C. Police and the U.S. Marshal were determining somebody's gender. And as it turns out, the first time an individual was arrested in D.C., it was recorded in this
P.D.I.D. system, what their name and gender was. And then it would never be changed.
So even if an individual changed their birth certificate, changed their driver's license,
did everything possible to legally change their name and gender, the P.D.I.D. system
would never be updated. Lauren Ober: We reached out to D.C. Police many times to talk about this case, but never got a response.
One of the hardest things to understand about this story is that if Patti had not been in
the system at all, there shouldn't have been a problem, she would have been detained with
other women. But because she was in the system as male from when she was fingerprinted back in 1984,
she was put with men. It was like nothing that had happened over the last 25 years mattered.
Her legal gender didn't matter. Her physical body didn't matter. The computer said male, so the officers put her with men.
Or at least that's the reason they gave. Patti sued both the D.C. Police and the U.S. Marshals in federal court, on the grounds that they violated her constitutional
rights, including her right to reasonable search and seizure and her right to due process.
In other words, being searched by male officers and locked up with men was a threat to her
safety and violated her rights, not as a trans woman, but as a woman. Patti's lawyer argued the case from that point.
Jeffrey Light: There hadn't been a lot of litigation under the fourth and fifth amendment
of the rights of transgender individuals. What we ended up doing in this case is applying the line of cases that look at the rights
of women, how they're to be treated under the constitution. And so cases that say, it is clearly unconstitutional for a man to strip search a woman in the absence
of emergency circumstances. We argued, and the court agreed, that that line of cases should apply.
The court further agreed with us that there's no reason to differentiate a transgender woman
from any other kind of woman. And as Patti frequently said during the case, "I mean, is this how you'd want your mom or
your sister to be treated if they were arrested?" Lauren Ober: The judge ruled in Patti's favor and wrote in her opinion that Patti's constitutional
rights had been violated. Police appealed, but before the case went back to trial, they settled out of court.
Patti received an undisclosed sum of money. The monetary compensation wasn't the only victory.
Her case impacted how trans people should be treated by law enforcement. Jeffrey Light: One of the parts of the settlement with D.C. was that they would have a new procedure
for placement and search of transgender individuals who are in the Central Cell Block underneath
the courthouse. And so somebody who is arrested and placed in Central Cell Block will hopefully not have
the experiences that Patti had, because the policies have changed. Lauren Ober: The other change might seem like a minor detail, but it actually addressed
the crux of Patti's troubles: the P.D.I.D. computer system. Thanks to Patti, it can now be changed to reflect a person's legal gender.
Patti Hammond Shaw: It was like finally, my voice is being heard. And I'm glad that I was able to be the one to help change the law.
But it should have never came down to this. I don't care if I'm locked up 50 million times, still respect me.
OK, I'm a female, I'm a woman. Lauren Ober: These days, Patti keeps herself to herself.
She doesn't go out much except to walk her two elderly dogs. And she's heading back to school to get her commercial driver's license.
She wants to be a city bus driver. I feel like you'd be a good Metrobus driver, because they don't take any shit.
And you're a lady who doesn't take shit. Patti Hammond Shaw: No, I don't. I stand up for my rights, sure.
Phoebe Judge: Lauren Ober. [Music.] Criminal is produced by Lauren Spohrer and me.
Audio engineering help from Rob Byers and Russ Henry. Special thanks to Erica Daniels.
Julienne Alexander makes original illustrations for each episode of Criminal. You can find them at thisiscriminal.com.
Criminal is recorded in the studios of North Carolina Public Radio, WUNC. We're a proud member of Radiotopia from PRX, a collective of the 13 best podcasts around.
We're coming to the West Coast to do a little tour in a few weeks. You can find out more information at thisiscriminal.com.
We'll be in Seattle, San Francisco and Los Angeles, and we'll start here in Durham, North
Carolina. Radiotopia from PRX is supported by the Knight Foundation and Mailchimp.
Celebrating creativity, chaos, and teamwork. I'm Phoebe Judge, this is Criminal.
Jingle: Radiotopia, from PRX.

Patti Hammond Shaw, a transgender woman, has legally idenitifed as a woman on both her birth certificate and dirver's license since 1993. In 2009, she was arrested, was strip-searched by male police officers in front of male prisoners and held overnight in the men's cellblock. Patti's lawyer fought back her landmark case was instrumental in changing the way police detain transgender individuals in Washington, D.C.

This story was reported by Lauren Ober. https://twitter.com/OberandOut

Music in this episode: “Demalion Theme” by Blue Dot Sessions “Jail” by Plusplus “Deserted City” by Kai Engel “The Plastic Cow Goes Moooooog” by Future Sauce

Criminal is a show about people who’ve done wrong, been wronged, or gotten caught somewhere in the middle. Hosted by Phoebe Judge. Part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

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Episode transcripts are posted on our website https://thisiscriminal.com/.

Episode 28 originally published 10/9/2022 https://thisiscriminal.com/episode-28-p-d-i-d-10-9-2015

Brief Summary

Patti Hammond Shaw shares her traumatic experience with police after an assault, highlighting issues faced by transgender individuals in the legal system.

Key points

Patti's Assault and Arrest. Patti Shaw recounts a shocking incident where she was assaulted and then arrested.
Legal Battle for Rights. Patti's case against the police highlights the treatment of transgender individuals in custody.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

I said, "Under arrest? For what?".

Patti's disbelief at being arrested after being assaulted.

2:25WatchNov 8, 2022

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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