Case Summary and Outcome

The Inter-American Court of Human Rights held that Honduras violated Leonela Zelaya’s right to freedom of expression, under Article 13 of the American Convention on Human Rights, by arbitrarily detaining her on discriminatory grounds linked to her gender identity and expression and by later disregarding that identity during the investigation into her death. The case arose in a context of structural violence against LGBTIQ+ persons in Honduras, particularly trans women, and concerned Leonela, a trans woman, sex worker, and person living in extreme poverty, who was repeatedly detained by police in 2004 and later killed in Comayagüela. After her death, State authorities registered her as male, referred to her in stigmatizing terms, and failed for years to conduct a diligent investigation. Before the Court, the Inter-American Commission argued that the State had interfered with Leonela’s ability to live and express her identity as a trans woman, while Honduras partially acknowledged responsibility, including for discriminatory treatment based on her gender identity. The Court reaffirmed that gender identity and gender expression are protected under Article 13 and held that Leonela’s detentions were arbitrary, discriminatory, and carried out under vague police rules that enabled abuses based on prejudice. It further held that the State violated Article 13 by erasing Leonela’s gender identity in official and judicial records during the criminal investigation. The Court ordered Honduras to reopen the investigation with reinforced due diligence and a gender perspective, publish and disseminate the court judgment, hold a public event acknowledging responsibility, reform its police legislation, and adopt additional measures aimed at preventing repetition.

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Facts

Leonela Zelaya “was a trans woman,” who had been rejected by her family since childhood, and was expelled from her home because of her gender identity. [para. 37] As an adult, she no longer maintained any relationship with her biological family. She lived in conditions of “extreme poverty,” “could neither read nor write,” “was living with HIV,” had been diagnosed with tuberculosis, and worked as a “sex worker.” [para. 37] Since 1995, she had lived in Tegucigalpa with Thalía Rodríguez, also a trans woman, who was her closest emotional bond and with whom she shared housing, care, and economic and emotional support.

Leonela was detained by the police five times, once in 1998 and four times in 2004. The 2004 detentions took place on January 20, May 26, August 11, and September 2, for alleged offenses of vagrancy, drunkenness, or disorderly conduct in public, as provided in Articles 99 and 100 of the 2001 Law on Police and Social Coexistence.

On the night of September 6, 2004, Leonela and Thalía went out to work. The following morning, a woman selling candy found Leonela’s lifeless body in Comayagüela. That same day, the police and the prosecutor’s office carried out the removal of the body, and the forensic examination concluded that she had died from stab wounds. However, in the initial official records, “Leonela was registered as a male person whose name is unknown (Homosexual).” [para. 42] In addition, the records of her death show that the authorities described her by referring to her feminine appearance, her makeup, her painted nails, and her shoes. The initial reports also did not reflect any steps aimed at determining whether sexual violence had occurred, and no photographs of the scene were taken because the authorities did not have the necessary materials.

Thalía learned of Leonela’s death hours later, when she was told that the incident was being broadcast on television. She later went to the morgue to retrieve the body. The wake and burial were organized by trans women who were friends of Leonela and Thalía.

In a newspaper article published by El Heraldo on September 8, 2004, it was reported that “the Investigative Police were searching for those materially responsible for the death of a homosexual, whose body was found on Seventh Avenue with a stab wound to the chest. The police identified the victim as Óscar Murillo Zelaya, 28 years old, who was known in his world as Leonela.” [para. 45]

On September 8, 2004, the case file concerning Leonela’s death was formally opened. On September 20 of that year, the prosecutor’s office initiated an investigation for homicide to the detriment of an unidentified person. However, no “investigative steps or procedural acts were carried out from then until mid-2018.” [para. 47]

On December 28, 2012, Red Lésbica Cattrachas, together with the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Center, filed a petition before the Inter-American Commission.

Separately, on May 7, 2018, the case was assigned to the Special Prosecutor’s Office for Crimes against Life in Honduras. In addition, investigative measures were ordered to locate witnesses, obtain the autopsy, collect the body removal report, identify suspects, and determine whether the death had been motivated by hatred or by other circumstances.

On July 16, 2018, the Commission declared the petition admissible through Report No. 84/18.[1] Subsequently, on December 25, 2021, the Commission issued Merits Report No. 450/21, in which it concluded that Honduras was internationally responsible for multiple violations of the American Convention and recommended full reparations for the victims and the continuation or reopening of the criminal investigation with due diligence.[2] That report was notified to Honduras on April 11, 2022, but the State failed to comply with its recommendations.

In 2019, “as a result of the investigation and in light of the testimony of protected witnesses, the identity of the person responsible for Leonela Zelaya’s death was established,” but because that person had died in 2007, the case was closed. [para. 51]

On April 11, 2024, the Commission submitted the case to the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. Before the Court, the Commission alleged, among other violations, an infringement of Leonela’s freedom of expression under Article 13 of the American Convention, in connection with discriminatory State treatment based on her gender identity and expression.

On October 12, 2024, the State responded to the Commission’s application before the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. In that response, Honduras partially acknowledged its international responsibility, including the facts related to the discriminatory treatment Leonela received on account of her gender identity and the failure to recognize her name in official documents.

[1] https://www.oas.org/es/cidh/decisiones/2018/hoad2362-12es.pdf

[2] https://www.oas.org/es/cidh/decisiones/Corte/2024/HN_13.645_ES.PDF

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Decision Overview

Due to the complexity of the case, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights examined various alleged violations of multiple rights protected under the American Convention on Human Rights. This analysis focuses exclusively on freedom of expression issues, in their dimension of gender identity and gender expression. The central question before the Court was whether Leonela Zelaya’s detentions, the discriminatory treatment she received from the State after her death, and the shortcomings in the investigation violated her right to freedom of expression under Article 13 of the Convention, in connection with her right to freely express her gender identity.

The Commission argued that Leonela Zelaya’s death had to be understood within a context of structural violence against trans women in Honduras and that the facts could be characterized as a prejudice-based killing linked to her gender identity and expression. It also alleged that the State had violated, among other rights, her right to freedom of expression because the violence suffered by Leonela and the failure to recognize her gender identity constituted a direct interference with her ability to live and outwardly express her identity as a trans woman.

For its part, the State partially acknowledged its international responsibility, including the violation of Article 13 of the Convention, and admitted that “in the present case, it is evident that, in the context of the facts, Leonela Zelaya suffered discriminatory practices based on her gender identity.” [para. 15] The State also accepted its international responsibility for the failure to recognize Leonela’s name in official documents.

As to the partial acknowledgment of responsibility, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights held that, although Honduras did not expressly accept all of the facts of the case, its statements reflected recognition of key facts: discrimination based on Leonela’s gender identity and expression during the investigation into her death, and the delay in that investigation. On that basis, the Court considered that several violations were no longer in dispute, including the violation of Article 13 of the Convention linked to the failure to recognize Leonela’s name in official documents, as well as the unreasonable duration of the criminal investigation.

In turn, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights emphasized that “the partial acknowledgment of responsibility made by the State constitutes a positive contribution to the development of this proceeding, to the validity of the principles that inspire the Convention, and to the satisfaction of the reparation needs of victims of human rights violations.” [para. 25] However, the Inter-American Court considered it necessary to rule on the merits because “this contributes to the reparation of the victims, to preventing similar acts from being repeated and, ultimately, to fulfilling the purposes of the inter-American jurisdiction.” [para. 27] The Court also explained that “the matters relevant to the reparations requested” by the Commission still needed to be resolved. [para. 24]

The Court underscored that the facts of the case took place in “a context of discrimination and violence against persons belonging to the LGBTIQ+ population” in Honduras, particularly against trans persons. [para. 34] In that context, “trans women sex workers were frequent victims of lethal and non-lethal episodes of violence; reports of these episodes of violence mostly involved police officers, and there was a perception of impunity that discouraged the filing of complaints.” [para. 34]

The Inter-American Court of Human Rights further specified that gender identity “refers to the internal and individual experience of gender as each person feels it, which may or may not correspond to the sex assigned at birth.” [para. 65] It also explained that gender expression “is the external manifestation of a person’s gender, through physical appearance, which may or may not correspond to gender identity.” [para. 65]

The Court then recalled that trans women may have a feminine gender identity or expression that does not coincide with the sex recorded in their official records. On that basis, it reiterated that gender identity and gender expression are categories protected under Article 1.1 of the American Convention, and therefore any norm, act, or practice based on them in a discriminatory manner is prohibited. The Court added that, pursuant to Article 24 of the Convention, persons with diverse gender identities and expressions are entitled to equal protection of the law, so that any discriminatory application of a rule on those grounds must also be examined in light of that provision.

Moreover, citing its own precedent in Hernández v. Honduras, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights held that “the right of every person to autonomously define their sexual and gender identity and to express it” is protected by “freedom of expression (Article 13)” of the Convention. [para. 64] The Court added that this is because sexual and gender identity are linked to the recognition of juridical personality, private life, the free development of personality, and the “right to express one’s identity in accordance with one’s own convictions.” [para. 64]

Against that background, the Court examined Leonela’s detentions in 2004. The Court observed that Articles 99 and 100 of Honduras’s 2001 Law on Police and Social Coexistence, which had been used to justify those arrests —based on categories such as “vagrancy,” “scandal,” or ambiguously defined conduct— were imprecise, granted an excessive margin of discretion, and rested on potentially discriminatory criteria. The Court further stated that the detentions were carried out “under the protection of a legal framework that did not comply with conventional requirements” and that enabled discriminatory practices based on gender identity and expression. [para. 103]

The Court explained that Leonela suffered a form of intersectional discrimination arising from the combination of her gender identity, sex work, poverty, illiteracy, and health status, factors that deepened her exclusion and exposure to violence.

The Court then emphasized that, where gender identity and expression are concerned, it was the State that bore the burden of showing that the difference in treatment was justified and did not stem from stereotypes. In that regard, it stated that “detentions based on the supposedly inherent characteristics or conduct of a person or group of persons are arbitrary.” [para. 85]

Likewise, the Court recalled that Honduras had failed to provide objective elements justifying Leonela’s detentions. On that premise, the Court held that Leonela Zelaya’s detentions were arbitrary and discriminatory, taking into account her situation of special vulnerability, the context of violence against trans women in Honduras, and the absence of objective grounds justifying the arrests. In particular, the Court held that Leonela “was arbitrarily detained and without an objective and reasonable justification” and, given the indications that those detentions were based on her “gender identity and expression,” declared that the State had also violated her right to freedom of expression under Article 13 of the American Convention. [paras. 86-87]

The Court also examined the way in which the authorities treated Leonela’s identity after her death, especially during the criminal investigation. On this point, the Court stressed that, in an investigation into a violent death, the proper identification of the victim is a minimum standard, and it observed that the State had sufficient information from the outset regarding her name, surname, and identity, yet the investigation nevertheless “proceeded as if it concerned an unknown person.” [para. 116]

In addition, the Court held that the authorities failed to properly document the scene and did not identify witnesses in a timely manner. In turn, the Court emphasized that “the investigative steps undertaken did not take into account the context of violence against the LGBTIQ+ population in Honduras, nor the elements indicating that the incident could be linked to the victim’s gender identity and expression, in particular, the fact that she was a trans woman engaged in sex work.” [para. 121] In that regard, the Court held that the State’s omissions disregarded the duty of reinforced due diligence required in cases involving violence against trans women.

For all of these reasons, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights concluded that, “within the judicial proceedings, particularly in the documents related to the investigation of what occurred, the State disregarded Leonela Zelaya’s gender identity and expression.” [para. 130] It therefore held that the facts of the case constituted, among other violations, a violation of Article 13 of the American Convention on Human Rights.

As for reparations, the Court ordered the State to unarchive the case file and, within a reasonable time, conduct a criminal investigation aimed at clarifying the circumstances of Leonela’s death and, where appropriate, prosecute and punish those responsible. It also ordered that the investigation must be carried out with “reinforced due diligence and a gender perspective.” [para. 147] The Court also ordered the publication and dissemination of the judgment, including on official State websites and social media accounts, as well as the holding of a public event acknowledging international responsibility.

With respect to guarantees of non-repetition related to gender identity and expression, the Court noted that several measures had already been ordered in Hernández v. Honduras, including the adoption of a gender identity recognition procedure, an investigation protocol for cases of violence against LGBTI persons, and a permanent training plan for security forces on sexual orientation, gender expression, and due diligence. For that reason, the Court did not repeat those orders in identical terms, although it did require that the State’s data collection system include information on the progress of investigations and impunity rates in cases of violence against LGBTIQ+ persons. Finally, it ordered Honduras to amend, within two years, the Law on Police and Social Coexistence so that it establishes “as concretely as possible, the grounds and conditions required for the imposition of minor-offense sanctions involving deprivation of liberty.” [para. 170]

As for monetary reparations, the Court awarded equitable compensation for the harm caused by the violations declared. However, it declined to order monetary compensation in favor of Leonela Zelaya, having found it established that she had been rejected by her biological family, no longer maintained any relationship with them, her body was not claimed by her relatives, and that Thalía Rodríguez —with whom she had formed a structure of support, solidarity, and mutual care— had also passed away. By contrast, the Court ordered the State to pay USD 20,000 in favor of Thalía Rodríguez, to be distributed to her successors in accordance with Honduran law. The Court also ordered the State to pay USD 15,000 in costs and expenses, divided between Red Lésbica Cattrachas (USD 10,000) and the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Center (USD 5,000).

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