They tried to murder a transgender teenager in El Salvador

Ana C, a 16-year-old trans teenager, survived a knife attack after a man tried to slit her throat.

Trans youth accused of torture in Paraguay

October 7, 2019

By Paula Rosales

Ana C, a 16-year-old transgender teenager, survived a knife attack after a man tried to slit her throat in a hate-motivated act, LGBTI activists in El Salvador reported.

According to witnesses who spoke to Presentes, the teenager arrived, as usual, at the street where she does sex work and was approached by a man who took her to an alley in the city and subsequently injured her neck, causing a deep wound in the area of the jugular veins.

Her coworkers noticed what had happened, rushed to her aid, and alerted the police. Ana C. was rushed to a public hospital, where her bleeding was stopped with surgical staples.

“I am weak and very ill,” the teenager told Presentes, as she recovers from the attack she suffered on the night of October 3 in the city of San Miguel, 140 kilometers east of the capital.

According to a human rights defender, who asked not to be identified for fear of reprisals, the attack should be classified as a hate crime against the LGBTI population because the perpetrator tricked the victim into going to a dark place with the intention of murdering her.

“He pretended to be a customer, but his intention was to kill her. It’s a clear hate crime because she’s a trans woman,” she told Presentes.

The attack was not recorded

In 2019, four transgender women were murdered in El Salvador. The Central American nation, which is hostile to the LGBTI population, recorded a homicide rate of 50.3 per 100,000 inhabitants in 2018, one of the highest in the world.

“Who knows if the police will even investigate the case, because there’s a huge lack of effort in investigating our crimes. The attacker already knows where she is, they can investigate everything about her life, and she risks retaliation. That’s why we’re asking them to act swiftly so that justice is served and the attacker is captured,” the advocate emphasized.

Meanwhile, the National Civil Police delegation in the department of San Miguel indicated that there have been no arrests yet regarding the incident and that the attack was not recorded in the institution's logbook.

“We have no record of that, since there was no arrest it doesn't appear anywhere. If someone had been arrested, it would be reflected in our records,” the officer on duty told Presentes.

In 2015, the Salvadoran Congress amended the penal code so that crimes committed due to discrimination based on gender identity and sexual orientation are condemned based on the criterion that they were committed out of hate and can be punished with a sentence of 30 to 60 years in prison.

According to the Solidarity Association to Promote Human Development (ASPIDH Arcoiris Trans), since 1993 to date they have registered the murder of some 600 women, very few cases have been investigated and prosecuted.

“When these acts occur, transphobia spirals out of control, and there is not only one victim but usually several victims, which is why we demand that the authorities carry out the legal process for this aggression,” the advocate stated.

We are Present

We are committed to a type of journalism that delves deeply into the realm of the world and offers in-depth research, combined with new technologies and narrative formats. We want the protagonists, their stories, and their struggles to be present.