A sex offender who received full gender surgery says she'd be safer in a women’s prison

A transgendered adult female incarcerated as a unsafe offender since 2001 for sexual urge offences against multiple women wants a try to order Correctional Service of Canada to transfer her from the men’s prison system to a women’s institution following her recent gender surgery.

Correctional officials have opposed requests from Amanda Joy Cooper, 58, to be moved to a women’s prison, citing in court records her risk to reoffend and history of “obsessive attachments” to female staff, concluding she would pose a “very high risk to the safety” of the other inmates.

A hearing in the case is set for next week in Federal Court, with her Nova Scotia lawyer arguing that Cooper should be sent to a women’s prison because her sex, post-surgery, is now female as defined in correctional policy, and she fears for her safety in a men’s facility.

While the placement of offenders who identify as transgender women has been a source of debate for years, Cooper is one of the few currently in federal custody who have had full gender surgery, and one of an even smaller number of post-operative inmates denied transfer to women's prison.

“I think it's complicated,” said Rosemary Ricciardelli, a professor at Memorial University in Newfoundland who has researched transgender prison policy, including a study involving interviews with dozens of federal correctional officers.

“I think it's really, really complicated, because each human being has rights and we have to adhere and do our best to meet those rights. So meeting one person's rights can't compromise another, and vice versa.”

The current federal policy dictates that transgender inmates can apply to transfer to a men’s or women’s prison according to their gender identity or expression. Requests are examined on a case-by-case basis, including an assessment of needs, risks, and health and safety concerns.

Over an eight-year period up to March 2025, there were 129 requests from inmates assigned male at birth to be placed or transferred into women's institutions, according to figures provided by Corrections Canada. About three dozen were approved, with the remainder either denied (72) or withdrawn (22).

Gender-diverse offenders represent about one per cent of federal inmates. As of October, there were 90 who identified as transgender women, including no more than a dozen who have had gender surgery. Seventeen were housed in women’s facilities and the remaining 73 in men’s prisons.

Cooper was born in Montreal in 1967 and committed numerous sex offences in the area as a man before being sentenced as a dangerous offender. A psychiatrist noted Cooper’s sadistic urges, and the judge in the case said the offender “does not hesitate to use his strength, weight, and size to control his victims.”

Cooper is currently incarcerated at Millhaven Institution, a men’s maximum security prison located west of Kingston, Ont. According to an affidavit she filed in court, she was assessed for gender dysphoria in 2017 and began identifying as a woman three years later.

She underwent gender surgery in September 2024. She now has a vagina and breasts. She has no penis. Her correctional records now list her sex as female.

Since her surgery, Cooper has been in what she described as self-imposed isolation in a structured intervention unit, the term used by Corrections Canada for units that replaced solitary confinement in 2019.

According to her affidavit, she has been bullied and threatened by male inmates, and one grabbed her buttocks. She said she fears physical and sexual violence, and has been repeatedly called a derogatory term. She said she only leaves her cell to make phone calls, for health care, education and programs, and for meetings.

“On average, I am out of my cell only a couple hours per day at most,” she said in the affidavit. €œOn weekends, sometimes I am out of the cell only 20-30 minutes per day. As a result, I have very little meaningful social interaction.”

At the hearing next week, Cooper’s lawyer, Jessica Rose, will ask a judge to order that Cooper be sent immediately to a women’s prison, even before her full judicial review in the case is decided.

At the heart of the argument in favour of transfer, Rose points to a Correctional Service of Canada commissioner’s directive issued in 2022 that states the sex of an offender “is determined solely by their current genitalia.”

Even if Corrections Canada is reluctant to move an inmate who requests a transfer based on their gender identity, Rose argues the directive indicates officials should house them based on their current sex.

“From our perspective, Amanda's gender identity and her genitals align. She is physically a woman, she identifies as a woman,” Rose said in an interview at her Dartmouth, N.S., office where she does work for PATH Legal, a law firm associated with the Elizabeth Fry Society of Mainland Nova Scotia.

“She is post-gender confirmation affirmation surgery at top and bottom. So from our perspective, there's no legal basis for CSC to be maintaining her in a men's prison, regardless of whatever security or safety considerations they may be relying on.”

The lawyer added: “Her message to us and her message to the court is, ‘I'm a woman with a vagina in a men's prison. You think I'm safe here?’”

But Corrections Canada has major concerns, outlined in internal records and court affidavits, if Cooper were to be transferred to a women’s prison.

Up until 2018, much of her time in federal custody was spent in the Special Handling Unit, a super-maximum men’s prison in Quebec, where she was sent in 2002 after threatening to sexually assault and kill female staff, according to records.

In an affidavit from last September, a parole officer said Cooper had been “increasingly verbally abusive” toward female staff in recent months, and there were a number she was not allowed to have contact with.

“Overall, CSC believes that the applicant’s gender identity, hormone treatments, and gender affirming surgery have in no way mitigated her risk to reoffend,” the affidavit said. 

“She denies that the offence cycle that currently exists is accurate, believing that the offence cycle belongs to her dead self. This claim does not show accountability from the offender as she places the blame on her dead identity rather than her current self.”

The correctional service argues women’s prisons are run differently than men’s, with most female inmates living in congregated settings and under less supervision. Introducing Cooper to a women’s prison would require so much security it could “create apprehension and fear” among the other inmates.

The documents note Cooper has been provided with women’s clothing while in men’s prison, as well as accessories such as nail polish. She is also only to be strip-searched by female officers.

Parole and court documents detail a history of multiple sex offences, committed when Cooper went under a different name and identified as male.

Cooper’s offending began in early adolescence, sexually assaulting women in the street. It culminated in 1998 when, over the course of several days following release from prison for sex crimes, Cooper grabbed and threatened to rape a 12-year-old girl in a parking lot, and sexually assaulted two women.

One of the women, who had parked at a mall, managed to flee her car following a struggle with Cooper, letting out what witnesses later described as a “death cry.”

In 2018, shortly after being transferred out of the Special Handling Unit, Cooper sexually assaulted a female prison worker, according to court documents.

Heather Mason, a former federal inmate who co-founded an organization now suing the federal government over its policy allowing what the group calls “trans-identifying male inmates” to move into women’s prison, said Cooper should not be granted the transfer she seeks.

Mason’s organization, Canadian Women’s Sex-Based Rights, advocates for spaces such as washrooms and locker-rooms to be segregated by sex.

“Sexual violence isn't prevented by surgery,” Mason said of the Cooper case. €œCorrectional Service of Canada has already said that this individual's behaviour and history make them a high risk to women. That assessment matters far more than anatomy.”

Prison operates very differently from the outside world, she said. It’s close, confined quarters that an inmate can’t leave, and many incarcerated women have themselves been victims in the past. It doesn’t matter the intentions of a transgender prisoner, Mason said, female inmates will not view them as a woman.

She said an alternative is for Corrections Canada to dedicate a wing of a prison to gender-diverse inmates, where they can receive programs and support tailored to them.

Corrections Canada declined to do an interview about the transfer of transgender inmates. In a statement, a spokesperson said its policy “reflects CSC’s commitment to respecting gender identity and expression, in accordance with the Canadian Human Rights Act.”

“If health or safety concerns are identified and cannot be effectively mitigated, the placement or transfer request may be denied,” the statement said. €œIn all cases, measures are implemented to support the person’s gender-related needs where they reside.”

The statement noted inmates unhappy with the decision can turn to Corrections Canada’s internal complaints and grievance process, and to external bodies such as the Canadian Human Rights Commission and the Office of the Correctional Investigator.

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