Monica Jones was walking to meet friends at a bar in 2013 in Phoenix, Arizona. When two men offered her a ride, they turned out to be undercover cops. And they arrested her for something called “manifesting prostitution."
It didn’t require evidence she was doing sex work. Under this law, anything from waving at a car to dressing in club attire gave handcuff-happy cops an excuse.
Jones was even more at risk for this charge because she is a Black trans activist.
Black trans community members and celebrities rallied in Jones’ support until her conviction was thrown out in 2015.
Still, almost half of Black American trans people have experienced incarceration, a rate much higher than the general population’s. Black trans people also have a 26% unemployment rate, and over 40% have been unhoused.
This is a vicious cycle of criminalization, discrimination, and poverty, and is one reason some people engage in sex work.
Being born Black is a crime to the criminal legal system. And for Black trans women in particular, existing in public is automatically criminalized and sexualized in uniquely dangerous ways.
Though these laws may get axed or reworded, the motivation behind what happened to Jones will remain unless the system is dismantled.