D.C. police are investigating an incident wherein a 43-year-old transgender girl says she was attacked and assaulted by three males round 1:30 a.m. Sunday, June 29, as she was driving her battery powered scooter close to the Lincoln Memorial.
District resident Cayla Calhoun, a well-liked bartender and sommelier on the D.C. restaurant Annabelle, instructed the Washington Blade she is struggling to recall the small print and attainable a number of areas of the assault because of the extreme head accidents she has suffered.
A police report says Calhoun was discovered mendacity on a curb on the intersection of 19th Road and Structure Avenue round 6 a.m. on June 29.
A GoFundMe attraction posted by her buddy Ellen Vaughn, which experiences Calhoun was discovered semiconscious at the moment and brought to George Washington College Hospital, says her accidents embody two concussions, a number of damaged ribs, seven cranial fractures, and a fractured elbow.
The police report says Calhoun known as for an ambulance on the 19th and Structure Avenue location and instructed the emergency medical technicians who arrived on the scene that her accidents have been attributable to her falling off of her skateboard a number of instances.
The police report says three days later, on July 3, whereas on the hospital, Calhoun instructed police “that she now remembered being assaulted by three males at 19th and I Road, N.W.,“about three quarters of a mile from the place the ambulance technicians discovered her on Structure Avenue.
Calhoun instructed the Blade she believes her reminiscence was defective on the time she first spoke with the ambulance technicians and police attributable to her head accidents. She stated she is now starting to recall that the three male attackers, whom she describes as white males, first approached her as she was driving her scooter close to the Reflecting Pool near the Lincoln Memorial.
She stated the incident occurred whereas she was taking her routine after-work scooter trip shortly after she accomplished her bartending shift at Annabelle at 11:30 p.m. on Saturday, June 28. She stated her typically every day after-work scooter trip, which she took on the evening of the assault, includes touring alongside a motorbike path on the Rock Creek Parkway previous the Kennedy Heart to the Lincoln Memorial.
From the Lincoln Memorial she rides alongside the Reflecting Pool towards the Washington Monument, round which she circles earlier than beginning her trip house, heading north on 15th Road to her residence at 15th and R Road, N.W.
She stated that on the evening of the assault she now recollects passing three males who have been additionally on scooters someplace close to the Lincoln Memorial and the reflecting pool.
“As I handed them, they yelled faggot and pedophile at me,” she instructed the Blade. “I used to be pulling onto the world there by the reflecting pond. And I figured I’d trip straight away.”
As greatest she recollects, the lads adopted her “and pushed me off my scooter and continued to yell slurs.” She stated she recollects making an attempt to trip away from the lads and that her interplay with them might have continued in different close by areas. However attributable to her head accidents she stated she doesn’t recall being assaulted by the attackers, though the a number of accidents to her head and physique satisfied her they needed to have struck her not directly a number of instances.
“I’ve an area the place I can see myself in that second pondering to myself this isn’t good,” she stated. “Any person is making enjoyable of you. You should go as quick as you’ll be able to and it’s essential to discover individuals. And that’s the final thought that I bear in mind taking place till the hospital.”
The D.C. police report lists the incident as an Aggravated Assault and identifies the weapon as “palms/ft.” The report lists the suspected motive as “Hate-Bias” based mostly on the sufferer’s “Gender identification — anti-transgender/transsexual.”
A D.C. police spokesperson stated the case stays beneath lively investigation and that anybody with details about the case ought to contact police at 202-727-9099.
The assault in opposition to Johnson occurred six days earlier than one other D.C. transgender girl, Dream Johnson, 28, was shot to loss of life round 12:30 a.m. on July 5 in entrance of an house constructing at 2013 Benning Rd., N.E., in keeping with a D.C. police report.
Police have but to determine a motive in that case. However one among Johnson’s members of the family, her aunt, has stated she realized by means of somebody who spoke to a witness to the taking pictures that three males had approached Johnson whereas she was strolling alongside Benning Highway and one among them known as her a derogatory identify earlier than one among them shot her a number of instances.
Police are providing a $25,000 reward for info resulting in an arrest and conviction of the individual or individuals chargeable for the homicide. Anybody with details about this case is being requested to contact Murder Detective Natasha Kennedy, the lead investigator, at 202-380-6198.
Native transgender rights advocate Earline Budd stated near 100 individuals turned out for a candlelight vigil held in Johnson’s honor on Saturday, July 12, at D.C.’s River Terrace Park. Amongst those that spoke on the vigil have been Japer Bowles, director of D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser’s Workplace of LGBTQ Affairs.
Additional particulars concerning the Cayla Calhoun case might be accessed by means of her buddy’s GoFundMe attraction.
