Valerie Jackson

A three-judge panel of the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals today (Monday, March 29) issued a ruling reversing a lower-court ruling dismissing Dallas trans woman Valerie Jackson’s civil lawsuit against former Dallas County Sheriff Lupe Valdez, Dallas County Sheriff Marian Anderson and Dallas County, claiming that DCSO deputies and employees violated her constitutional rights related to her gender identity. But the three-judge panel refused again to reverse Judge Brantley Starr’s refusal to recuse himself from the trial.

“We affirm the denial of the motion to recuse, reverse the dismissal of the municipal liability claims against Dallas County and Valdez and Brown in their official capacities, and remand for further proceedings consistent with this opinion,” the panel — consisting of Judges Rhesa H. Barksdale, Leslie H. Southwick and James E. Graves Jr. — wrote. The judges said this ruling will not be published,  which it cannot be cited as precedent except under the limited circumstances explained in Fifth Circuit rules.

Jackson’s lawsuit stems from a November 2016 incident in which Jackson was arrested for having a gun in her purse when she tried to go through security at Dallas Love Field airport. Jackson told Dallas Voice at the time that a friend had given her the gun for self protection when she was being stalked by a man who had been connected to assaults on one woman and threats to another, She said she had forgotten she had it in her purse when she went to the airport to catch a flight for a vacation with friends. The charges against Jackson were later dropped.

When she was arrested, Jackson was transferred to the Dallas County Jail where, she said, she was repeatedly misgendered despite legal identification bearing her appropriate gender and was repeatedly humiliated when she was forced to undergo strip searches, forced to show her genitals with to male deputies, housed with male inmates and forced to shower with male inmates.

A spokesperson for Dallas County Sheriff’s Office, then led by Sheriff Lupe Valdez, later acknowledged to Jackson and to Dallas Voice, after a review of video showing  Jackson’s time in the jail, that some parts of DCSO’s policy regarding treatment of transgender inmates had been “misconstrued” and that other parts “were not followed.”

(Read Dallas Voice’s story from when Jackson filed her lawsuit here.)

Jackson filed a formal complaint after the arrested. She was then arrested in April 2017 and again in June 2018, and both times, she said, she misgendered, housed with male inmates and forced to shower with male inmates. She filed suit against the former sheriff, the current sheriff and the county in November 2018.

The case was transferred to Judge Starr’s in September 2019, at which time Jackson’s attorney, Scott Palmer, moved for Starr to recuse himself, based on his anti-LGBTQ history.

Starr was appointed to the judiciary in May 2019 after being nominated by then-President Trump, despite strenuous objections by LGBTQ advocates. Lambda Legal noted, in a letter to Sens. Lindsey Graham and Dianne Feinstein of the Senate Judiciary Committee, that Starr “has been a vocal opponent of LGBT nondiscrimination protections throughout his career,” having “advocated for broad religious exemptions that would allow child welfare providers to turn away LGBT foster and adoptive parents, authored guidance that would allow county clerks to refuse to issue marriage licenses to LGBT couples and [argued] against the inclusion of transgender students under Title IX protections.”

The letter also alleges that Starr for years “has played an active role in working to undermine the legal protections of LGBT people in the state of Texas,” including
providing in-person testimony, while working as a deputy attorney general in the Texas Office of the Attorney General, during legislative hearings in support of a bill allowing foster agencies to discriminate against prospective LGBTQ parents and against LGBTQ children and youth in state care, despite the OAG’s neutrality on that legislation.

The appellate court, however, denied Jackson’s appeal on Starr’s refusal to recuse himself, noting that during judicial confirmation hearings Starr had said he would “set aside his personal beliefs and apply binding precedent when asked about the legal treatment of LGBTQ individuals. His answers support the conclusion that he is committed to applying the law accordingly. … We cannot say that the district judge’s decision not to recuse himself … was an abuse of discretion.”

Read the complete ruling here.

— Tammye Nash