Remembering Our Dead

Tarayon Corbitt

Tarayon was shot twice in the head and once in the chest with a .45 Glock handgun.

The murder of a teenage [trans woman] in Alabama and the slaying of a young mother in New York are among the so-far unsolved cases that police say could be linked to Robert Lee Yates Jr. of Spokane.

The sheriff in Dale County, Ala., already knows that Yates, a former Army helicopter pilot, was stationed at Fort Rucker from July 5, 1995, to April 1, 1996, when a 19-year-old [trans woman] was shot in the face several times with a .45-caliber pistol on Aug. 10, 1995. The [woman], Tarayon Corbett, was from Dothan, Ala., about 20 miles south of the post.

"The killer was looking at [her] at the time," Dale County Sheriff Bryant Mixon said.

The body of Corbett, wearing long hair, a dress and women's shoes and underwear, was found the next morning in a remote area alongside the Choctawhatchee River.

Mixon said that Corbett, who had considered [gender confirmation surgery], was good at [presenting] as a woman, and whoever shot [her] likely did not know [she was trans].

The night before his death, Corbett was seen near a nightspot in Dothan. It is unknown how [she] got to the remote location 10 miles away where he was shot and killed, Mixon said.

https://archive.seattletimes.com/archive/?date=20000422&slug=4016858

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/10_JeZ7LEIRhvewTCoL5mVkH6MQJzf7fSXl4-P6QJ0v0/edit#gid=0

https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-dothan-eagle-murder-of-transgender-p/143308828/

https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-dothan-eagle-obituary-for-tarayon-de/143308867/

Report added: 17 Feb 2019. Last updated: 13 Mar 2024

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