On the 7th of February, a 16-year-old student at Owasso High School in Owasso, Oklahoma entered the girls’ bathroom. 24 hours later, that student would be dead.
The student, Nex Benedict, has been identified in many reports as being nonbinary, and NBC News has reported — from speaking to friends of Benedict — that he preferred he/him pronouns. Oklahoma law requested students to use the restroom consistent with his sex at birth, so he was in the girl’s restroom.
While in the restroom, a trio of girls laughed at Benedict and another friend who was in the restroom. According to an interview later that day, Benedict told a school resource officer that these girls had previously mocked Benedict and a friend due to their choice of clothing. This harassment had, apparently, been happening for a week or so, but Benedict never reported it, saying, “I didn’t really see the point in it.”
In retaliation, Nex Benedict poured some water on the girls. The girls beat him, with Benedict briefly blacking out after he hit his head on the bathroom floor.
The school did not call for medical attention, but, rather, issued a suspension of Benedict. Sue Benedict, the grandmother and guardian of Nex Benedict, was called to pick him up at school, and took him to Bailey Medical Center. It was some time after this that the school resource officer conducted an interview at the hospital. When Sue Benedict told the officer that she may wish to press chargers, the officer threatened that Nex might also be charged, causing Sue Benedict to decline.
He was discharged from the medical center, but collapsed in the living room the next day. By the time a medical team arrived, Benedict had stopped breathing. Later that evening, at the hospital, he was declared dead.
In the wake of Benedict’s death, Owasso Police Department spokesperson Nick Boatman implied that Benedict’s death was not due to the head injuries, implying that more information will come out once the coroner provides the toxicology results. Boatman also said that the department had released incomplete information to, “head off national scrutiny.” They have since backtracked on this, stating that they have not actually ruled out trauma from the cause of death.
Also, I would be remiss to not add a comment from Oklahoma Senator Tom Woods who, when asked in the wake of the death why the legislature has “an obsession with the LGBTQ citizens of Oklahoma and what people do in their personal lives and how they raise their children,” went on the record to state that his constituency, “doesn’t want that filth in Oklahoma.”
Oklahoma has already filed 60 anti-trans bills within the last two months, including bills that will place felony penalties on those providing gender-affirming care, a drag ban, and a ban on birth certificate amendments.
I wanted to lay out these facts as carefully as I could. A hostile state that is seeking to take away any right to be trans in Oklahoma. A school would not seek out medical care for an injured student — but would instead suspend them. A resource officer that sought to squelch charges, and another officer that broadly implied — and I’m being generous here — that Nex Benedict’s death was not because he’d been slammed into the bathroom floor. All of these elements — and more I don’t have room to get into here — played a part in Nex Benedict’s death.
This death has left me incandescent with rage and, to be honest, I have had a hard time trying to manage my own feelings around this case. Every time I think about it, I find myself angry all over again.
Last November, I spoke at a Transgender Day of Remembrance event not far from me. One of the other speakers was a nonbinary student. Super enthusiastic, very happy with the path of self-discovery they were on — but they had also clearly had to deal with the fallout including, yes, at school. They’ve very much been on my mind. How many other kids are out there, and how many of them are just as threatened as Nex Benedict was?
Of course, I also thought about my own school years. I wasn’t out back then, but the school bullies had me pegged. Unlike Nex, I didn’t use any restroom at school. Doing my best to hold things until I could get home. I avoided lunch at school. Nevertheless, I used to get beaten at school near-daily, and still have chronic pain in my back and shoulder to this day.
My school’s response to this, by the way, was to send me to the school psychologist: his task was to teach me not to cry as I was beaten. I would like to think that, all these years later, things would have not gotten worse than that — but here we are, with a student who was beaten, blacked out, and instead of being offered medical assistance, was suspended from the school.
Forty Owasso High School students walked out in the wake of Benedict’s death, saying that bullying is common on campus, but accountability is rare. I suppose no one should be surprised with people like Tom Woods in the Oklahoma Senate, and the constant onslaught of anti-trans bills at the statehouse.
Like so many before, I hope that Nex Benedict’s death will not be in vain, and that maybe this will finally spark people to finally say no more to this wave of anti-trans animus gripping our country.
I fear, however, that this is but the start.
Gwen Smith wants to see justice for all of our Nex Benedicts, all our Leelah Alcorns, and everyone in the transgender community. You can find her at www.gwensmith.com.