A trans woman from the Urals was sentenced to four years in a male prison colony. This is the first public case of a trans transition being reversed against the individual's will.

The sentence was handed down by the city court St. Petersburg, 7x7 reports, citing the woman's lawyer. According to the defense, the state effectively cancelled the gender marker change in her documents in order to ensure the woman's transfer to a male prison colony.

However, the decision to revoke the documents was not carried out; the woman was sent to the pretrial detention center with a valid female passport.

She was initially convicted of publishing nude photographs and depressive poems, which investigators deemed "pornography" and "incitement to suicide." The court sentenced her to five years' probation. However, the prosecutor's office later overturned the sentence. The complaint claimed that at the time of the "crime," her passport listed her gender as male, and changing it to female may have been an attempt to mitigate her sentence. After consideration, the court imposed a prison sentence.

Human rights activists believe that transgender status is effectively being used as an aggravating circumstance, although the law does not provide for this.

This means the court effectively agreed that trans transition is not a matter of identity, but a criminal act intended to obtain benefits. Furthermore, being sent to a men's prison and surrounded by men could pose a direct threat to a trans woman's life and turn her sentence into a real torture.