UPDATE: On Wednesday, Nov. 10, 2021, Ruben Alvarado was convicted and sentenced to 37 years in prison for the 2019 murder of Chynal Lindsey. Please take care when reading this article.

HRC is deeply saddened to learn of the death of Chynal Lindsey, 26, a Black transgender woman found dead in Dallas on June 1.

Lindsey’s body was found in White Rock Lake with “obvious signs of homicidal violence,” according to Dallas Police. No further details are available at this time, and the Dallas Police Department has reached out to federal law enforcement to aid in the investigation.

Friends, family and community members took to social media to share their shock at her death, describing her as “smiling” and “a person I had never seen mad.”

Lindsey’s death is the eighth known case of deadly violence against the transgender community in 2019 -- and she is the third Black transgender woman killed in Dallas in the past year.

“I and the Texas trans community still haven't had time to regroup after laying Muhlaysia Booker to rest,” said transgender advocate Monica Roberts. “[A] mere 24 hours after Dallas Pride happens, we are now having to say the name of another of our trans siblings gone far too soon in her young life.”

Muhlaysia Booker was fatally shot on May 18. Just a month prior, Booker had been viciously attacked in what Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings described as “mob violence.” And last year, the Dallas community mourned the death of Brittany White, who was found fatally shot.

Police say there is no evidence at this time that these three deaths are linked.

“We see this phenomenon far too often, that violence will bubble up in a specific area or state each year,” said HRC National Press Secretary Sarah McBride, who characterized the attacks in Dallas as part of a larger nationwide trend. “There are concerns around contagion or a copycat effect each time a community witnesses a significant number of cases of anti-transgender violence.”

Last year, advocates tracked the deaths of at least 26 transgender people, the majority of whom were Black transgender women.

In November, ahead of Transgender Day of Remembrance, HRC Foundation released "A National Epidemic: Fatal Anti-Transgender Violence in America in 2018," a heartbreaking report honoring the trans people killed and detailing the contributing and motivating factors that lead to this tragic violence.

It is clear that fatal violence disproportionately affects transgender women of color, and that the intersections of racism, sexism, homophobia, biphobia and transphobia conspire to deprive them of necessities to live and thrive.

This epidemic of violence that disproportionately targets transgender people of color -- particularly Black transgender women -- must cease.

To learn more about HRC’s transgender justice work, visit hrc.org/Transgender. For more information about how to support Texas’ trans community, check out the Transgender Education Network of Texas.