Trans woman who concealed she had male genitalia before performing sex act on man is found guilty of sexual assault | Daily Mail Online

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Male or female, the person looks like Sloth from the goonies.

Really should be codified what exactly a person must disclose to get informed consent. Eg HIV status?

I’ve seen cases for back and forth and that inevitably lead to courts having to do it peicemeal. I don’t disagree with the ruling here but it shouldn’t have fallen to the judge.

Having it clearly defined would clear a lot of this up.

Makeup is truly astonishing, you could paint the face from that second photo on my arse given a big enough brush.

This killed me:

The judge further summarised the defences case as: ‘Whatever Ciara might believe about successfully fooling (him), she is so obviously male, he couldn’t have been fooled.’

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-_4Wqm_zhIY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-_4Wqm_zhIY)

This happened to me but in the context of a relationship. I had no idea it was a crime to conceal. Fully supportive of trans people but the trust violation really hurt me.

Absent the pretty awful discussion both from the BBC and the comment section here, this judgement has some pretty serious ramifications from the snippets available in the article.

The judgement seems to be that the lack of consent was because the defendant didn’t inform the victim that she was transgender, which is pretty broad.

Previous cases involving deception as to one’s sex (by nominally not transgender people) typically involved some pretty material misrepresentations – the defendant using a different name and gender presentation to their day-to-day life, requiring blindfolds during sex to avoid detection, or passing off the use of a dildo as an actual penis. They’re deceptions as to the actual nature of the sex act; who you’re having it with, what type of sex you are having.

There are a few details to this case that *might* approach that sort of standard taken in bulk, if the judgement does focus on them and it isn’t included in the article:

* The defendant wasn’t medically transitioning in any way at the time, i.e. was fully ‘biologically male’.

* The defendant claimed to be on her period to avoid the victim touching her in such a way as to find out that she was not cisgender.

Taken together, you could potentially say that these reflected a deliberate intent to mislead the victim. I’m not completely sure how well it would hold up in other situations – what if a trans woman is put in a threatening situation during an encounter and lies about having a period to get out of it? – but I could see this joining the prior cases on the basis of “deliberately misrepresenting yourself as a sexual partner”.

If, as the article says, she violated his consent because she didn’t tell him she was transgender, that’s liable to cause some serious issues.

* Transgender people would *always* have to be very explicit to their partners that they were trans. If the lawyer’s line of “it was very obvious she was trans” didn’t apply, you could not ever safely assume your partner was aware and consenting. It’s “we can always tell” combined with “you always have to tell us”.

* This could apply to any sort of sexual act. Would it be a crime to kiss someone in a club without telling them you’re trans? What about cuddling or any sort of petting/fondling? If you think someone might be about to kiss you after some flirting do you have to come out to them?

* Can mere knowledge of something you find unpleasant constitute a violation of consent? I wouldn’t voluntarily sleep with someone if they were cheating – however, if someone doesn’t tell me about their wife, I don’t think that should constitute rape.

* This formalises the idea that transgender people are engaging in a constant deception, which isn’t right. I just want a body that feels like home and a quiet life – I’m not some sort of undercover pervert looking for thrills.

* Perhaps most scarily, it’s a way to instantly turn any sort of sexual encounter with a transgender person into a crime. If you have sex with someone who is trans, all you need to do is say that you didn’t know they were trans (even if you did) and you have a case for sexual assault. Given the social stigma against any sort of attraction to trans people, this is quite a potent weapon.

Personally, I think the rules should remain that there needs to be a material misrepresentation as to the nature or quality of the sex act. Unknowingly snogging a trans person you find hot at a rave is not a crime, even if you find trans people gross – you were attracted to the person in front of you and not mislead about anything. The standard for ‘sex deception’ should be more akin to using a fake identity materially different from your own, or doing something like trying to pass anal sex off as vaginal, etc.

Sounds like a crime was committed and courts/police acted correctly. Is this big news?