Ralayzia Taylor, a 24-year-old transgender woman, was brutally attacked with a hatchet and seriously injured in a Charlotte, North Carolina park. The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department (CMPD) have arrested three individuals in connection with the assault.
One of the attackers stabbed Taylor in the back several times as they also attempted to rob her, according to police reports. In a heartbreaking interview with local media, Taylor recounted the tragic and violent incident.
“They probably just wanted to rob someone that day and then when they found out I was transgender, it got worse,” Taylor told WNCN.com. Throughout the attack, Taylor said the three attackers repeatedly yelled anti-LGBTQ slurs.
“I really felt like I was dying slow,” she recalled. “After that third time of that knife being stabbed in my back, I’m just like ‘Oh, I don’t think I can do it.”
A spokesperson for the FBI said that they are collaborating with the CMPD to investigate the incident as a possible hate crime.
The FBI recently released hate crimes statistics for 2015, a year which saw a seven percent increase in overall hate crimes. The Southern Poverty Law Center has reported more than 300 incidents of harassment or intimidation since the election of Donald Trump last Tuesday night.
North Carolina is also home to the hateful and discriminatory HB2, an outrageous and unprecedented anti-LGBTQ law.
Our hearts go out to Taylor as she recovers from this horrific attack and we call on everyone to stand against violence of any kind.
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