Missouri

Brian J. Richardson, former Deputy Commissioner of the City of Chicago Department of Health, has been named Lambda Legal’s Midwest Regional Director, based in Chicago.

47 businesses, attorneys general from 15 states and the District of Columbia, the nation’s leading LGBT rights organizations, and several other organizations submitted friend-of-the-court briefs to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit in support of Lambda Legal client Mark Horton, a gay man whose job offer from a St. Louis-based health management organization was withdrawn after the company’s owners learned Horton is gay.

Yesterday, Lambda Legal asked a federal district court to order the Missouri Department of Corrections (MDOC) and Corizon LLC (Corizon) to provide medically necessary, doctor-recommended health care for the treatment of gender dysphoria for Jessica Hicklin, a 38-year-old transgender woman incarcerated at the Potosi Correctional Center in Mineral Point, Missouri.

Today, the Missouri Court of Appeals reversed a lower court decision and granted a new trial to Michael Johnson, an HIV-positive black gay man, who is currently serving 30 years in prison under an out-of-date law that criminalizes the sexual conduct of people living with HIV.