Day Rodas

Day Rodas, a 27-year-old transgender woman who worked for the Los Angeles LGBT Center in the Community Health Center program, was found dead Thursday, Dec. 1, on a Malibu roadside. Police have not given a cause of death but have said her death is being investigated as a homicide.

Rodas is at least the 36th trans person to die violently in 2022. According to her sister, Susie Rodas, on the GoFundMe she started to help pay for funeral and memorial expenses, Day Rodas had only recently come out as transgender.

Susie Rodas said on the fundraising page that her family had gone to police to file a missing person report after Day stopped responding to calls and texts. “Her boss from work called saying she didn’t show up to work, so we knew something was wrong,” Susie Rodas wrote. “She also had moved back in with us, so when she didn’t arrive home for two days. we knew there was a problem.”

She said police called the family a few hours after they filed the report, letting them know the body found on the Mulholland Highway around 7:45 a.m. Dec. 1 matched the description of her sister.

“She recently started living her life authentically as she came out to friends and family about being a trans woman,” Susie Rodas wrote. “She was the most forgiving person [and] advocated for LGBTQ rights. She had so much love for family and friends, and she saw the good in everyone. Despite some people treating her with disrespect because she finally started being who she truly was she never disrespected anyone; she was too pure and kind to ever treat anyone with disrespect.

“After being afraid for 27 years, she only got to live freely without fear for only six months which breaks our hearts.”

— Tammye Nash