A transgender man was brutally killed in a trailer park, and tragically, law enforcement authorities misidentified his gender.

This blog originally appeared at LGBTQ Nation.

Contradictory information on a driver’s license results in heartbreak for the victim’s family and friends.

The killing of a transgender man in August has transformed into a learning opportunity in the progressive Wayne County, Michigan. Bereaved friends and family found themselves compelled to advocate for his gender identity posthumously.

The tragic slaying of 26-year-old Jean Butchart, who was shot in the head by a stranger on a warm August evening in Belleville, deeply disturbed his close ones. However, their grief was compounded by a series of misinformation fueled by conflicting reports about his gender.

During the search for Butchart’s murderer, inconsistent details on the victim’s driver’s license resulted in both law enforcement and the media misidentifying his gender as female.

“It was an inadvertent error,” Julisa Abad, a transgender woman and the director of transgender outreach for the advocacy group Fair Michigan, shared with the news outlet MLive.

On the day of his tragic death, Butchart had just commenced a new job in landscape maintenance at a mobile home park. Responders discovered him lifeless on the ground, with no pulse and a gunshot wound to the head. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

Although Butchart’s driver’s license indicated male, his name had not yet been updated on the document, resulting in his deadname being reflected. While Michigan has streamlined the process of changing gender on identity documents, altering a name is more intricate, time-consuming, and, for some, financially challenging.

Eyewitnesses at the crime scene identified Butchart as Jean, utilizing the French pronunciation common in the Great Lakes region near Quebec. Consequently, the police were informed about the victim’s male gender identity.

“He was referred to as Jean,” stated Van Buren Township Police Chief Jason Wright. “That’s how we were informed.”

In the subsequent days, as the incident was reported both internally and to the public, the contradictory details on his driver’s license became a cause of sorrow.

Initially, the Van Buren Township Police Department issued a news release regarding Butchart’s death in connection with the apprehension of Matthew Torrey Tiggs Jr., 22. Tiggs faced charges related to Butchart’s murder, as well as attempted murder and assault in two other incidents spanning ten days in August.

The release specified the victim as “26-year-old Jean Butchart” without any mention of gender.

Subsequently, when the prosecutor’s office released a statement, Butchart was identified by their deadname, with “Jean” included in quotes, following the convention for nicknames.

“Due to the use of female names without clarification of the victim’s gender identity, the entry ‘male’ [for Butchart] was mistakenly assumed to be an error,” clarified Maria Miller, the director of communications for the prosecutor’s office.

The dissemination of this misinformation was magnified in news coverage and across social media platforms, causing frustration and anger among Butchart’s friends and family. They inundated officials with an email campaign, urging a correction and a formal apology.

“We extend our apologies to his family, friends, and the transgender community,” stated Miller in an email. “We promptly rectified this error upon confirming Mr. Butchart’s gender identity. There was never any intention to misgender Mr. Butchart.”

Although the error was distressing for Butchart’s friends and family, Miller described the case as “beneficial” in prompting cultural competence training for officials in Wayne County.

Presently, 18 local police departments have participated in a dedicated training session, and additional sessions are scheduled for other Wayne County police departments and the sheriff’s office.

“We need to recognize that not everything originates from a malicious intent,” remarked Julisa Abad of Fair Michigan. “We’re all continually learning about the complexities of the LGBTQ+ umbrella—I don’t even know all of it.”