Excerpts from ... WorldNetDaily.com
Posted: July 17, 2003
A federal judge says it could be cruel and unusual punishment to deprive a convicted killer from getting a sex change, and taxpayers must pick up the tab for medical treatment leading to the procedure.
Mark Brooks, who believes he's a "girl inside" and calls himself Jessica Lewis, and is suing the Clinton Correctional Facility in Putnam County, N.Y., for $500,000 to finance a gender transfer. ..
Brooks scored a victory this week when U.S. District Judge Lawrence Kahn ruled the suit could proceed and that prison administrators allow him to consult with physicians about his gender-identity disorder. ...
Kahn says decisions about treatment need to be made by medical professionals, not prison administrators, and cited the Eighth Amendment prohibiting cruel and unusual punishment which he said can include "deliberate indifference to serious medical needs." ...
"Surely inmates with diabetes, schizophrenia or any other serious medical need are not denied treatment simply because their conditions were not diagnosed before incarceration," he wrote. ..
Brooks, 34, was convicted in 1990 for a murder in upstate New York and is serving a sentence of 50 years to life. ..