TDoR 2002 / 2001 / December / 12 / Terrianne Summers


Terrianne Summers

Age 51

12 Dec 2001
Jacksonville, Florida (USA)
Shot

TDoR list ref: tdor.info/12 Dec 2001/Terrianne Summers

Terrianne Summers
Terrianne Summers [photo: wearinggayhistory.com]

Terrianne was shot dead in her own front yard days after participating in the 2001 Transgender Day of Remembrance in Florida.

Every year, in addition to the names on the list, I remember Terrianne Summers. She was my transmom. She was on 2002’s TDOR list, having been murdered in Dec, 2001...on her own front lawn in Jacksonville, Florida. She was the one who taught me what I know today about activism in the transgender community, and I owe her much. It is hard to believe that she has been gone for nearly seventeen years now.

To this day, her killer has never even been identified, and Terrianne lives in the cold case file of the Jacksonville PD...MMISGENDERED!! The very REASON for which she was killed...and the cannot offer her the basic dignity, in death, to gender her properly. This is why I continue to fight...because of people like Terrianne.

Will you join us? Will you hold candles and read names with us...give dignity to those who never got dignity in life...or in death? Will you hear our voices, will you see our tears?

She was a transgender activist in the Jacksonville area, who had been very involved in efforts against discrimination at the Winn-Dixie food chain.

On Jan. 6, 2001, Terrianne Summers made a splash in The Florida Times-Union. Summers was pictured leading a protest at Winn-Dixie headquarters in Jacksonville. The company had fired a truck driver who told his supervisor that he occasionally cross-dressed during off hours.

Times-Union readers saw the 51-year-old Summers holding high a poster that shouted in big block letters: "TRANSGENDER PEOPLE HAVE RIGHTS TOO."

By December, the truck driver's lawsuit against Winn-Dixie hadn't been resolved. Summers was organizing another January protest when she was shot to death in the driveway of her Jacksonville home.

At first, Jacksonville police tagged it as a robbery attempt. Apparently, though, none of Summers' possessions had been taken or even disturbed. Even so, Lt. Rick Graham said the murder was not being investigated as a hate crime. No arrests had been made at press time.

Gay and transgender activists called for a hate-crime investigation, both because of Summers' high profile as an activist and because transgender people are frequent targets of hate crimes — not to mention the fact that Summers' killing looked more like an assassination than some brutal chance encounter.

One thing seems certain: If another transgender person had died the way she did, Summers would not have kept quiet.

http://folioweekly.com/STRUCK-DOWN-IN-HER-PRIME,13801

https://jaxpsychogeo.com/west/murray-hill-heights-summers-day-terrianne-summers-day-avenue/

https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/intelligence-report/2002/remembering-victims-hate-crimes

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2018/11/14/1812943/-Transgender-Day-Of-Remembrance

http://wearinggayhistory.com/exhibits/show/advocacyexhibit/remember

Report added: 22 Dec 2018. Last updated: 13 Jan 2021

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