The mother of a trans offender at the centre of a new jail storm has claimed her daughter’s offending is the result of years of bullying.
Sharon Macklin claims that her daughter, Harryetta Thompson, has been constantly victimised during a traumatic life and a battle with mental and physical health problems.
The Daily Record told yesterday how Thompson, 33, was moved into segregation at Cornton Vale, Scotland’s only all-women jail, after word spread about her past sex crimes.
Harryetta had been allowed to mix within the jail’s general population until a fellow inmate overheard a phone conversation in which she mentioned a conviction at Stranraer Sheriff Court for grooming two boys in 2016.
Care worker Sharon, who now lives in Hereford, said her daughter had endured a lifetime of people pointing and laughing at her.
She said: “In many cases Harryetta will make bad choices and when she feels threatened she can respond impulsively, sometimes using sexualised gestures.
“She can verbalise things and behave in a way that’s crude and unacceptable and it can be heartbreaking to see how she deals with some situations, as she can often be irrational and delusional.
“I have to accept that there are consequences for her actions, for other people and for herself but she never sets out to cause trouble. I constantly hope she finds a way of sorting things out.
“When she says these terrible things and makes a scene it’s all a coping mechanism.”
She said: “I’ve gone out for a cup of tea with her and I’ve seen people laughing and sneering and calling her a freak."
Sharon said the current set-up in Scotland means there is no facility that is suitable for volatile trans prisoners like her daughter. She believes there is a strong case to be made for a “halfway house” facility for trans offenders.
She said: “I don’t think she would survive in a male prison. It would be a disaster and it would be wrong to put her there. Something terrible would happen to her.
“But I also, of course, do understand why many people would object to her being held in a women’s jail.
“I do believe there should be moves to develop a different type of facility, where trans prisoners can live alongside people who might understand them.”
Sharon said Harryetta was plagued with gender confusion from an early age and suddenly decided to live as a woman in her late teens, around 15 years ago.
She said: “She bagged up her clothes and took them to a charity shop and bought herself new clothes.
“By this time she was already having a lot of trouble fitting in.
Sharon said her daughter had begun hormone therapy several years ago and has desperately wanted to have a complete physical transition, but this has been denied, which has left her “in limbo”.
The revelations on Harryetta Thompson’s case emerged after a huge storm erupted over the moving of trans prisoner Isla Bryson, a double rapist, to Cornton Vale.
That decision was reversed and a U-turn also came on a decision to move trans prisoner Tiffany Scott to women’s jail.
The Scottish Prison Service is currently reviewing its policy on trans prisoners and individually reviewing the status of all trans inmates. Meanwhile they have said that new trans prisoners will be held in jails matching their birth gender.
