Trans Teen's Body Found; Suspect Faces Murder Charges

The body of a transgender teenager who had been missing since last June has been discovered in a rural area of Washington state. The man she was known to have been with on the day of her disappearance now faces murder charges, reports The Oregonian.

Police determined that the victim and the suspect had been in contact via Snapchat just before she vanished, media accounts said.

David Bogdanov had told police that he and 17-year-old Nikki Kuhnhausen of Vancouver, Washington, had been together around the time of Kuhnhausen's disappearance. His story was that when he found out Kuhnhausen was trans, he ordered her out of his van, reported ABC affiliate KATU news.

Vancouver police officer Lt. Tom Ryan told the media that the suspect "stated that [Kuhnhausen being transgender] was offensive to his culture and he asked her to get out of his van."

Ryan went on to say that although the cause of death has not yet been determined, "There was some evidence that indicates at least the potential of some strangulation involved."

Bogdanov told authorities that the last he saw of Kuhnhausen was when she left his van.

But records of Bogdanov's phone location on the day in question pinpoint him in the area of Larch Mountain, a remote location in Clark County, Washington where Kuhnhausen's remains were discovered.

Media reports said that the remains were found on Dec. 7. Kuhnhausen disappeared June 6; Police had been investigating since October.

Bogdanov is now in custody and was due to appear in court on the morning of Dec. 18.

The Human Rights Campaign, which tracks anti-trans violence, released an updated report last month. A National Epidemic: Fatal Anti-Transgender Violence in the United States in 2019 examines the cases of 22 known cases of lethal violence directed at trans and gender-nonconforming people this year. Most of the victims have been African American.

"Since January 2013, HRC has documented more than 150 transgender and gender non-conforming people who were victims of fatal violence; at least 127 were transgender and gender non-conforming people of color," the HRC noted. "Nearly nine in every 10 victims were transgender women and 58 percent of all domestic deaths occurred in the U.S. South.

"These disturbing numbers likely underreport deadly violence targeting transgender and gender non-conforming people, who may not be properly identified as transgender or gender non-conforming," the HRC added.

Anti-LGBTQ hate crimes, in general, have skyrocketed since the 2016 elections.

EDGE recently published an in-depth investigation on the epidemic of lethal anti-trans violence and the way African American women are disproportionately affected. The investigative piece examines ways in which trans people can be victimized even after being murdered in horrific ways, as when the media ignores a victim's gender identification and uses their "dead name," the name by which they were referred to before publicly identifying as the gender with which they identified. Police can also be slow to identify even the most brutal killings as hate crimes.

EDGE noted that behind the sensationalistic headlines lurk grim realities rooted in systemic inequities:

A cycle of poverty, crime, and incarceration caused by an array of circumstances trap many transgender women of color in a cycle that the country is struggling to break. Murders have occurred all across the country, from Detroit to Dallas, with trans women beaten, shot, dumped in lakes, left dead in parking lots and abandoned houses. Dallas and Kansas City lead the nation in trans murders.

Noted the article: "In Texas, gender identity is not listed under the state's hate crime statute, and gay or trans panic is still used as a legal defense."

One resident of the state who had lost two family members to anti-tans violence told the Dallas Morning News:

"Why it's happening more in Texas now is we don't have transgender laws that cover our rights... People feel like they can get away with more. There's always been violence. But they're killing us now."