Thursday, August 13 in Montpellier, a 22-year-old transgender woman was the victim of a rape attempt followed by an assault with shards of glass. With around a hundred wounds, she was hospitalized.
She had come to observe the tags and graffiti covering the walls of the tunnel along the Verdanson quays, a canalized passage in the northeast of Montpellier’s city center. She emerged bearing around a hundred cuts. On Thursday, August 13, around 5:30 p.m., a 22-year-old transgender woman, whose identity was not disclosed, was assaulted by two men. “They would have first groped her, then attempted to rape her”, reports the Montpellier national police to Têtu.
According to the preliminary elements of the investigation, the violence would have intensified when the two men realized they were dealing with a transgender woman. Insults were reportedly hurled, then the attackers allegedly assaulted her. “They would have slashed her body multiple times with shards of bottles before fleeing, leaving her bleeding”, the police said. Gravely injured, the young woman managed nonetheless to reach the public street, up to the corner of Boussairolles Street and Saint-Charles Avenue. Passersby found her covered in blood and alerted the emergency services. Transported to CHU Lapeyronie by the firefighters, she was able to be treated.
Injuries all over the body
Upon arrival at the hospital, the Montpellier resident, whose vital prognosis was not deemed life-threatening, presented wounds all over the body, mainly on the arms and legs, but also on the face. About a hundred lacerations were observed, necessitating around fifty stitches. The young woman was able to return home after two days of hospitalization. She has since filed a complaint. An investigation has been opened to locate the two attackers and to determine precisely the circumstances of the assault. The police are notably counting on the surveillance camera images installed in the area. “The place is not known for being particularly sensitive”, specifies the national police. The images are currently being examined. At this stage, no arrests have been announced. The transphobic nature of the violence, if mentioned by the victim in her account to investigators, will have to be established during the course of the investigations.
The assault sparked indignation among LGBTQI+ associations. In a statement, Stop Homophobie, which is supporting the victim, called for recognizing the scale of the violence: “Whatever qualifications will ultimately be retained by justice, the extent of the injuries observed is considerable”. It also stressed “that this case underscores the need for protection and tailored support for transgender victims of violence”. Meanwhile, the association Fiertés citoyennes, which advocates for the defense of republican, universalist and secular values, denounced in a tweet “the horror” of the assault and sent its support to the victim.
