Tragically, Redd was gunned down in Chicago, Illinois, on September 8, 2024, marking at least the 26th violent killing of a transgender or gender expansive person in this year. We say “at least” because too often these deaths go unreported — or misreported. The Human Rights Campaign is deeply saddened to report on Redd’s passing.

Darlene Joseph is one of Redd’s eight siblings. “I have not fully processed that she’s not here with us anymore,” said Joseph when speaking with Windy City Times. “She was full of life, and you could feel her presence whenever she walked into a room,” Joseph continued. “She had this positive energy that could brighten anyone’s day.”

Latoya Alexander, Redd’s mother, told the Windy City Times that Redd was an “ardent Nicki Minaj fan” who had just returned from Philadelphia where we saw the rapper for the second time this year. Redd had adopted the nickname Barbie after the rapper’s fan-favorite persona.

Speaking to various news outlets, Redd’s friends, family, and loved ones described her someone who loved doing hair and makeup, and who was “full of life” with “positive energy that could brighten anyone’s day.” She was an “ardent Nicki Minaj fan,” who derived her nickname of Barbie from Nicki’s own persona, who loved doing her friends’ hair and makeup, and who was considering starting her own business to sell lashes, wigs, and beauty products.

Redd was hanging out with friends in the Austin neighborhood of Chicago at around 1:30AM when, according to her friend Michelle Lee who spoke with The Advocate, an unknown man walked by them to talk to a woman from another nearby group. The man left the area only to return 30 minutes later, opening fire. Redd suffered gunshot wounds to her back and legs and was pronounced dead at the scene where 15 shell casings were found; initial reports unfortunately misgendered Redd and referred to her by her dead name. Another unidentified victim, who the Chicago Tribune described as also a trans woman, was taken to a local hospital and remains in critical condition from a gunshot wound to the chest.

Redd’s family is asking local authorities to investigate the murder as a hate crime. In an article from The Advocate, Mariyah Phillips, Redd’s cousin, is quoted as saying “I do feel like it was a hate crime. I want to start [bringing] awareness [that] people are really attacking that community. I want people to know that they are being attacked.”

More than 25,000 hate crimes in the U.S. involve a firearm each year, which equates to almost 70 cases a day, according to a 2023 report from Everytown for Gun Safety in partnership with HRC and The Equality Federation Support Fund, “Remembering and Honoring Pulse: Anti-LGBTQ Bias and Guns Are Taking Lives of Countless LGBTQ People.” The report also notes a marked increase in anti-LGBTQ+ hate crimes, especially against transgender people. In 2022, the most recent year for which data is available, the FBI recorded a record-high number of hate crimes related to gender identity, including a 33% jump in hate crimes on the basis of gender identity from the year before.

Gun violence disproportionately impacts the transgender community: To date, more than six in ten (61.5%) trans and gender-expansive victims of fatal violence in 2024 were killed with a gun. And the trans and gender-expansive community in Chicago are particularly impacted. Since HRC first began tracking fatal violence against the trans and gender-expansive community in 2013, HRC has recorded the deaths of 16 different trans or gender-expansive people in Chicago, more than any other city. Fourteen were Black trans women –over 87% of all victims in Chicago–among whom, ten were killed with guns.

Several of these victims were also memorialized at a vigil and balloon release held on September 11th in Redd’s honor at the Task Force, an organization that serves LGBTQ+ youth, which Redd herself had utilized when she was younger. Aliyah Mason, who led the vigil, and who had been friends with Redd for years, read out the name of nine other trans women who had been killed in Chicago over the past six years, noting “It’s easy to sweep us under the rug, but our names should live on forever. ”

At the state level, transgender and gender-expansive people in Illinois are explicitly protected from discrimination in employment, housing, education and public spaces. Illinois does include sexual orientation and/or gender identity as a protected characteristic in its hate crimes law. However, Illinois does not prohibit profiling based on actual or perceived LGBTQ+ status by law enforcement. Though we have recently seen some political gains that support and affirm transgender people, we have also faced unprecedented anti-LGBTQ+ attacks in the states. In June 2023, the Human Rights Campaign declared a National State of Emergency for LGBTQ+ Americans, as a result of the more than 550 anti-LGBTQ+ bills introduced into state houses that year, over 80 of which were signed into law—more than in any other year. As of this writing, over 500 anti-LGBTQ+ bills have been introduced into state houses since the beginning of 2024, with more than 30 bills passing to-date.

We must demand better from our elected officials and reject harmful anti-transgender legislation at the local, state and federal levels, while also considering every possible way to make ending this violence a reality. It is clear that fatal violence disproportionately affects transgender women of color, especially Black transgender women. The intersections of racism, transphobia, sexism, biphobia and homophobia conspire to deprive them of necessities to live and thrive, so we must all work together to cultivate acceptance, reject hate and end stigma for everyone in the trans and gender-expansive community.

More resources:

• Learn more about the fatal violence cases that HRC is tracking where details are unclear. You may find a list of these cases here.

• Join HRC's Count Me In campaign to take action for transgender and non-binary people.

• Read these guidelines and this FAQ for journalists to ensure greater accuracy and respect in reporting.

Learn about how transgender and non-binary people are combating transphobia, stigma and anti-trans violence through our Celebrating Changemakers series.