Remembering Our Dead

Lashai Mclean ("Shay")

Lashai was shot in an alley on the 6100 block of Dix Street NE at around 4am on 20th July. Two men are being sought in connection with the shooting. She died at the scene.

The location where she was shot is in the same neighborhood as the Wanda Alston House, the home for LGBT youth that is a project of Transgender Health Empowerment (THE).

Brian Watson, program director at THE, who lives in the neighborhood in which the homicide occurred, says Mclean was a THE client of but not of the Wanda Alston House.

''Lashai had been a client of ours for the last few years,'' he says. ''She was one of younger clients, she came to our drop-in center, most of our staff knew her because she came here on a weekly basis.

''There was a point where she was here almost everyday.''

At this point, Watson adds that THE is putting together what it can from minimal information. Watson says Mclean was with another member of the transgender community who ''got away,'' but that members of THE have yet to determine who that is.

''We haven't gotten any information from GLLU or anything, that's why we still don't know what's going on. … We don't know if police have anyone in custody, we don't know if they got away, we do know that someone was with Shay, but we don't even know who that was.''

More than 200 people turned out Saturday night, July 23, for a vigil to honor Lashai Mclean, a 23-year-old transgender woman who was shot to death three days earlier in Northeast Washington.

The event took place at the site where police say Mclean was gunned down about 4:30 a.m. near the corner of 61st and Dix Streets, N.E. Among those attending were Mclean’s mother and other grieving family members and relatives.

Deputy D.C. Police Chief Diane Groomes, who spoke at the vigil, said later that homicide detectives are pursuing information provided by a witness that the fatal shooting took place shortly after two unidentified males “had some words” with Mclean in an alley shortly before she was shot.

Neighborhood residents and passersby looked on with interest as more than a dozen speakers, including D.C. Deputy Mayor for Public Safety Paul Quander, condemned the murder and called on the community to speak out against violence targeting the transgender community.

“To the family and to the community, I want you to know that we are committed to making sure that justice is done, that this life that has touched many of us will be remembered and the life that she led will be remembered,” said Quander, whose duties include overseeing city law enforcement agencies.

“We will always be reminded that what happens to one happens to all of us,” he said. “Injustice to one is injustice to all of us and that in this society no intolerance will be accepted.”

‘Transrespect versus Transphobia Worldwide’ research project: Washington Blade, 25.07.2011

https://mpdc.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/mpdc/publication/attachments/mclean_myles_tr.pdf

http://www.homicidewatch.org/category/victims/myles-lashay-mclean/index.html

https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/transgender-person-slain-in-northeast/1898004/

https://dcist.com/story/11/08/02/police-admit-trans-crimes-could-be/

https://transtruecrime.blogspot.com/2018/08/the-murder-of-lashay-mclean-unsolved.html

http://nbjc.org/media-center/news/transgender-deaths-where-outcry

https://www.washingtonblade.com/2011/07/25/emotions-run-high-atvigil-for-slain-trans-woman/

https://transgriot.blogspot.com/2011/07/another-transsistah-killed-in-dc.html

https://www.advocate.com/news/daily-news/2011/07/21/transgender-woman-murdered-dc

https://www.glaad.org/2011/07/26/d-c-and-nation-mourn-loss-of-transgender-woman-lashai-mclean

https://web.archive.org/web/20111211050404/https://www.metroweekly.com/news/?ak=6435

Report added: 1 Nov 2018. Last updated: 11 Mar 2024

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