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Transgender Woman’s Murder Is Prosecuted as ‘Feminicide,’ in First for Colombia

Thousands turned out for a 2012 rally in Bogotá, Colombia, after Rosa Elvira Cely was raped and murdered in a park there. In 2015, a law passed in Ms. Cely’s name made feminicide punishable by a prison sentence of 20 to 50 years.Credit...Fernando Vergara/Associated Press

For the first time in Colombia, the murder of a transgender woman has been punished as a gender-based hate crime, three years after the passage of a law that imposes tough sentences for hate crimes against women.

The woman, Anyela Ramos Claros, was killed last year in the municipality of Garzón after being shot in the back by Davinson Stiven Erazo Sánchez, who months earlier had tried to attack her with a knife, according to court documents. She died of multiple gunshot wounds.

Ms. Claros owned a hair salon where he was a client, the documents said. After being apprehended by the authorities, Mr. Sánchez tried to justify his actions by citing Ms. Claros’s sexual orientation, according to prosecutors in Garzón, which is about 100 miles southeast of Cali.

On Dec. 3, Mr. Sánchez was sentenced to 20 years in a psychiatric facility for aggravated feminicide — the killing of a woman because of her gender — and for a weapons charge.

When he committed the crime, Mr. Sánchez was unable to understand his actions, the sentencing documents said, so he cannot be sent to prison, but will be placed in a psychiatric facility and subject to security measures. Mr. Sánchez received a diagnosis of schizophrenia.

Although the court referred to Ms. Claros by the name she was assigned at birth, Luis Ángel Ramos Claros, it recognized her as a woman, citing not only her appearance but also her female identity, which was recognized by her friends and family. Court documents state that she had breast surgery and was living as a woman.

The victim’s family was represented by Samuel Escobar and Julián Sinning of the law firm Casas & Escobar Abogados, which worked on the case pro bono, according to Colombia Diversa, an L.G.B.T. rights group in Bogotá.

In a statement provided to Colombia Diversa, the lawyers said they were “happy with the way in which the case was addressed by the court in Garzón, particularly with regard to the recognition of Anyela as a woman.” The lawyers added that the case signaled a change “in the way the judiciary and the prosecution are addressing crimes based on prejudice.”

The Rosa Elvira Cely law, which was enacted in Colombia in 2015, made feminicide punishable by a prison sentence of 20 to 50 years.

Ms. Cely, a 35-year-old single mother, was raped and murdered in a park in Bogotá in 2012. News of the crime drew thousands of protesters to the capital, where they demanded justice.

Mr. Sánchez’s punishment was the second time in Latin America that a man had been sentenced for feminicide of a transgender woman. The first instance followed the murder of Diana Sacayán, a human rights activist who was killed in Argentina in 2015.

Last year, at least 36 transgender women were murdered in Colombia, according to numbers released by the government.

A report from the United States Agency for International Development, the American foreign aid agency, found that from 2008 to 2013, Colombia had the fourth-highest rate of murders of transgender people in the world. In the city of Cali alone, 42 transgender women were murdered from 2005 to 2011, the report said.

In September, the European Union and the United Nations started a program to fight feminicide in Latin America.

There is no standardized definition of the term, which was first coined in the 1970s to refer to the killings of women and girls.

In Colombia, it is defined broadly as the killing of a woman because of her gender, or where there were previous instances of violence between the victim and the accused, including sexual violence.

In recent years, there has been a push, particularly in Latin America, to use the concept to create new legal categories and public policies.

Susan Beachy contributed research.

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