A transgender woman serving a life sentence for rape has been found dead in her cell at HMP Parkhurst, an all-male prison located on the Isle of Wight.
Martin Eatough, also known as Jade, aged 35, was discovered during a routine check at 5am on August 19. Eatough identified as female and was undergoing hormone replacement therapy as the initial step in transitioning but had not yet undergone gender reassignment surgery.
Sources revealed that Eatough was not on suicide watch and had been living normally within the prison. When officers checked her cell, they received no response and had to force entry, where they found her unresponsive. Paramedics attempted resuscitation, but she was pronounced dead at 5:45am.
Eatough’s death is the fourth suicide of a transgender inmate in male prisons in recent years, intensifying criticism of the Prison Service’s management of transgender prisoners. A source stated, “She was not on a suicide watch and was living normally.” Previous cases include Joanne Latham, who died by hanging at Woodhill prison in 2015, and 21-year-old Vikki Thompson, who took her own life at HMP Leeds just a month earlier.
Eatough was serving a life sentence after committing two attacks on young women on the same night in Blackburn in June 2005. He stalked a 19-year-old woman and indecently assaulted her on her doorstep, then raped a 15-year-old near the town centre within two hours. At sentencing, the judge warned there was a “real and significant risk” that Eatough might commit further serious offences.
Prisoners are generally held in facilities matching their biological sex unless they hold a gender recognition certificate, which Eatough had not received.
A Prison Service spokesperson commented: “HMP Parkhurst prisoner Jade Eatough died in custody on Saturday 19 August 2017. As with all deaths in custody there will be an independent investigation by the Prisons and Probation Ombudsman.”
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Originally published by UKNIP.
