A federal appeals court has ruled that a convicted and imprisoned child molester must be provided sex-reassignment surgery.
The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled on Friday that denying surgery for inmate Adree Edmo violates the constitution’s prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment.
Edmo, who is a man, began living as a woman when he was age 20 or 21.
He is currently serving a 10-year prison sentence at the Idaho Department of Corrections for sexually abusing a 15-year-old boy when he was 22. He is not eligible for parole and is currently detained in a man’s facility.
Following his state-funded sex-realignment surgery, he is expected to be transferred to a women’s facility.
The case gained national attention last December when a lower federal court ruled in favor of Edmo’s request to receive the surgery.
In January, Idaho Republican Gov. Brad Little condemned the lower court’ decision saying, “’The hard-working taxpayers of Idaho should not be forced to pay for a prisoner’s gender reassignment surgery when individual insurance plans won’t even cover it.”
Friday’s ruling makes Edmo the country’s first transgender inmate to receive sex-realignment surgery through a court order.
